Aly Merritt With Atlanta Tech Village

Intro: [00:00:00] Welcome back to the Startup Showdown podcast, where we discuss pitching, funding and scaling startups. Join us as we interview winners, mentors and judges of the monthly $120,000 pitch competition powered by Panoramic Ventures. We also discuss the latest updates in software Web3, Healthcare, Tech, FinTech, and more. Now sit tight as we interview this week’s guest and their journey through entrepreneurship.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:43] Lee Kantor here another episode of Startup Showdown, and this is going to be a good one. But before we get started, it’s important to recognize our sponsor Panoramic Ventures. Without them, we couldn’t be sharing these important stories. Today on Startup Showdown, we have Aly Merritt with Atlanta Tech Village. Welcome, ALy.

Aly Merritt: [00:01:02] Thank you so much for having me.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:03] Lee Well, I’m excited to hear your story and how you got involved with the Atlanta Tech Village. But before we get started, can you just share for the listeners who aren’t aware of Atlanta Tech Village Mission Purpose, how you serving folks?

Aly Merritt: [00:01:18] Yes, absolutely. So we are the fourth largest tech hub in the US. We focus primarily on startups with proprietary technology. We provide and allow faster access to talent, capital and ideas by supporting our just under 1200 entrepreneurs in 103,000 square feet.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:37] And then how did you get involved?

Aly Merritt: [00:01:40] Oh, this is this is a longer story. So I’ll try to truncate it a bit for you. This is probably my fourth or fifth career because unless you’re as far as I can tell a brain surgeon, your career, nobody’s career is just a straight hockey stick. Right. But most recently, I spent the last eight years at Sales Loft, which is a startup that came out of Atlanta Tech Village initially. So when I joined Sales Office eight years ago, they were on one of the yet to be renovated floors at Atlanta Tech Village, and I sort of grew up with them. We eventually outgrew the space and move to Regents Plaza where we have several floors. And you can tell I’m always a lawyer at heart because my pronoun is still we for sales loft in many ways and I sort of kept in touch with Atlanta Tech Village. It’s near and dear to my heart. The serendipitous interactions and the ecosystem here is really important. And then I ran the Startup Pitch competition for the last five years Atlanta Startup Village, and at some point there was a opening, and David Lightman and David Cummings very kindly reached out to me with an extremely vaguely bullet, pointed email and said, We have this position called Managing Director. Would you consider it? If so, what is? No. And I was I was sort of like I mean, yes, because when David Cummings makes you an offer, you don’t say no. But I also was very honest that I said, I don’t know anything about running a building, you guys. And they write back, Yes, you do. You ran the office team and were chief of staff at sales. Often it’s almost exactly the same. And it turns out that they were correct. So that’s the truncated version.

Lee Kantor: [00:03:26] Well, I think that Atlanta Tech Village is one of the the most generous gifts that any entrepreneur has ever given the city. And I think it has taken the startup scene to a new level and has kind of raised the bar for others in the city to give back and to and to build the community that David has built and his team has built. But now the tech village, like you said, has kind of left a mark and left ripples that go way well beyond Atlanta. Can you talk about how it has expanded from an Atlanta centric startup hub to what it is today?

Aly Merritt: [00:04:05] Yeah, well, and I think the important thing to note is that Atlanta is at the heart of what we do. We are here for the Atlanta ecosystem. One of the missions for Atlanta Tech Village. We had several and one of them is to help make Atlanta a top five startup city. So it’s bigger than just a TV itself as a hub. It is the city as a whole and it’s really become more of the region, right? The Southeast. How do we help drive entrepreneurship, investment startups in tech in the Southeast? And we’re lucky that we have first mover advantage in a lot of ways when to your point, David, coming so generously took that money from selling Pardot to ExactTarget instead of buying a small private island with $99 million, he invested in a building and built what he wished he had had when he had been starting Pardot. So we we try to take the visibility that we have, the reputation that we have to bring people into the city and into the southeast as a whole and benefit more than just Atlanta Tech Village to benefit the other incubators and ecosystems and entrepreneurs in the cities and in the rural areas in the Southeast.

Lee Kantor: [00:05:20] And can you talk a little bit about that collaboration and the ability to bring people together and create this sense of community? Because I think that is part of Atlanta’s secret sauce and what separates us from a lot of other areas, and that does give us a competitive edge. Can you talk about how just. That spirit of generosity. I mean, that that takes a level of humility and generosity to want to create a culture like that. Can you talk about how that kind of comes alive at Tech Village?

Aly Merritt: [00:05:54] Yes, absolutely you are. The soapbox that I like to get on actually is the community aspect and the collaboration that happens. One of my favorite things about Atlanta Tech Village itself, and then I’ll sort of expand that is the serendipitous interactions that happen. So you can get on the elevator in our club level and be talking to somebody about a project that they’re creating or service they’re creating. And by the time you get off the elevator on the fifth floor, somebody else on the elevator says, That sounds really cool. I think we have something complimentary. Let’s talk about I want to buy it or we should do an in-kind swap or something like that. And you get off with a new customer or a new partner. And I think that that’s that’s at the heart of what we do is how do we how do we collaborate with each other? It’s one of ATV’s core values, which is pay it forward, as well as be nice and dream big. And so those sort of coalesce into a collaborative approach to everything that it’s not just about you and what you’re doing, it’s about the community as a whole. And I think that this is evident in the fact that when you talk to people who come to us from other spaces and other other communities, other towns, other states that maybe are a little more competitive, one of the things that I’ve heard more than once is that when people in Atlanta say they’re going to introduce you to somebody, they actually do it. And that’s not how that happens in many other cities, because it is about bringing everybody together. And one of the things I like to use a lot is a rising tide raises all ships. So while we at ATV have a focus on proprietary technology, first of all, we’re not the only tech hub in the city or in the region.

Aly Merritt: [00:07:38] And there’s there’s plenty of room for all of them. There’s no reason for us to get territorial. Every ecosystem in the city, for example, has a slightly different focus or a different niche that they’re really good at. And there’s no reason for us to try and reinvent that. We need to cross collaboratively support it. So if you have a focus on tech, for example, you also have Tech Alpharetta, north of town, which has a focus on technology as well. And they serve an entirely different group, especially with Atlanta being as spread out as it is geographically tech. Alpharetta has more of an incubator model and have a little different focus for their tech. Atlanta provides more than just one space at D.C. out of Georgia, Tech has a focus specifically on technology as well. But they also have the skill set of they work within an academic institution that also more easily understands how to play nicely with governmental entities, for example, and they understand rules and regulations in a different way than some of the rest of us, and they’re able to provide that to their startups. You’ve got the Russell Center for Innovation, which is down next to HBCUs, and their focus is black entrepreneurship. So there’s lots of different spaces in town that are doing amazing things with a slightly different focus, and there’s no reason that we can’t all collaborate together on something bigger than ourselves. And there are some some things coming down the pipeline where Atlanta as a whole is going to be publicizing some of this behind the scenes collaboration that’s been happening for a little while now.

Lee Kantor: [00:09:09] You use the word community, use the word everybody. How do you kind of mindfully and purposefully create a community that does include everybody? And there’s a lot of underserved entrepreneurs out there that sometimes have a harder time plugging into communities like this one. How does a tech village kind of go to the market and welcome all?

Aly Merritt: [00:09:34] I think that’s a great question. And also a good point is that people like to talk about diversity, equity and inclusion, but a lot of times they may mean just one thing on the surface that they initially think about. So ATB itself does that in a couple of different ways. We ourselves have a pre accelerator that is specifically focused on underrepresented founders and we do two cohorts a year, typically 8 to 10 people you apply to be in it. And sometimes the founders are as early stages. They have an idea that hasn’t even made it to the back of the napkin yet. And we provide the resources and access to our mentors and advisors and the community here to start driving that idea forward with them. And at the end of the cohort, they receive non-dilutive capital from several of our key sponsors, specifically to give them the ability to move forward with that idea on a more level playing field that maybe they didn’t start out with because I don’t know about you, but I don’t have friends and family that can lend me $15 million for a pre-seed round. And most of our founders do not have that either. So how do we start? Along that playing field. So that’s how we internally do it. Externally, I think that it’s a bigger discussion around the concept of trust. And this is something I’ve spoken at with Jay Baily at the Russell Center at length is he and I talk about the idea of getting to know each other because that’s when you build trust and that’s when you also know what resources are being offered across town. And so he and I are sort of driving some collaboration efforts with the rest of the ecosystems in town, because there’s more to it than just coming to Atlanta and stopping at Atlanta Tech Village.

Aly Merritt: [00:11:15] So starting to create more of a welcome package kind of concept with new entrepreneurs and new investors coming to town so that they can see at a glance what’s happening in all the different spaces. And just because, again, we’re not the right fit. When people ask me about Atlanta, especially if it’s outside Atlanta, I was just at Miami, in Tech, in Miami at a tech conference, and I spoke to several startups and I said, you know, I don’t know that we align, but Atlanta aligns for you. And here are the directions that I would suggest you go. And then I made intros to those specific locations for those additional people. You’ve got locations like the gathering spot in town, which has a heavier focus on creatives and artists. You’ve got the Lola, which has a focus on women and female presenting people as a safe space. And so finding these pockets and being able to celebrate what they are providing and being able to make that more and more visible. So when you talk to me at Atlantic Village, if you’re in town for a tour, these are all spaces that I mentioned and ecosystems that I mentioned because I want there to be visibility. And then you have Startup Atlanta, which does a great job with the Startup Ecosystem Guide that identifies all of these different opportunities in town and is starting to build out as part of that welcome package. Being able to see at a glance where some areas that you might find your tribe are as well as making the entire ecosystem welcoming to anyone coming in.

Lee Kantor: [00:12:41] Now, if the person out there listening isn’t a tech person but is interested in tech startups, is there a place for a non tech? Entrepreneur in this ecosystem?

Aly Merritt: [00:12:56] Oh, absolutely. I am not a technical entrepreneur. I can’t code I. I have been working in a startup for eight years without an actual technical background. My undergrad degrees are basically art and writing journalism and graphic design. So I’d say two things to that. First of all, people do view tech the way I’ve just described it as being a software engineer and coding. And that’s not necessarily true. Technology is in almost everything now that we do in an entirely different way. Technology is wrapped up in what SCAD and its students are doing at the Savannah College of Art and Design in terms of 3D printing, for example, or augmented reality or virtual reality. But there’s also the aspect that just because it’s a technical company doesn’t mean that they aren’t people facing. You don’t do business with companies, you do business with people. And so your support team is important. Your customer success team is important, your sales team is important. These aren’t technical people per se. These are people skills. They’re softer skills. And so wanting to be a part of the, quote, tech community doesn’t mean you have to be a software engineer.

Lee Kantor: [00:14:07] Now, is that message, do you think, trickling down to young people, even at the elementary, middle school, high school level where they can see a startup as a path, a career path for them rather than a traditional, oh, I’m going to go to school, go to college, get a job.

Aly Merritt: [00:14:27] I think that’s an interesting question as well, because I think especially with the rise of things like boot camps and virtual auditing of classes, those have started changing the way people look at the traditional career path. And we are seeing quite a few people now who are getting jobs directly out of high school instead of going down this traditional university career path, if you will. And I was actually speaking with a larger corporation here in town that said that what they’re doing now is looking at recruiting, not just early stages of college and not even just high school, but trying to figure out how to partner with junior highs and middle schools to specifically get in there to help train students in areas that will lend themselves to technology but don’t necessarily have to be technology themselves. Again, there’s a lot of things going on, on the creative side that roll into technology. Video games are very visual, but there’s technology that drives that and you need both halves of that brain to happen. I think that that is starting to be more visible in the way that schools are training people. We have some high schoolers coming through actually tomorrow to go to our pitch practice event, and most of them aren’t technical high schoolers, but they are in the entrepreneurship program at their high school. And I think just the concept of entrepreneurs as creating your own business around something that you’re passionate around is starting to change. The commentary is that it doesn’t have to be a technical startup, it can be many other things.

Lee Kantor: [00:16:03] Yeah, I think that that’s critical for young people to open their mind to the idea of entrepreneurship as artist, in that they each create something from nothing and that there is a place for them in this world and this ecosystem, even if they don’t feel confident with their math and science skills. There is a place for great communicators, great writers. There is a place for them in this community. And I think it’s important for them to open their mind to that as a career path and explore it. And I and I am happy to see that a lot of educational institutions are kind of bringing in entrepreneurship early on in the education process. And just thinking like an entrepreneur pays benefits and that’s transferable down the road.

Aly Merritt: [00:16:50] Yes, absolutely. And you said something interesting just now about specifically communication as a skill set. And I think that’s a skill set that’s been potentially undervalued for a long time. But people are starting to realize that that’s very important. We see a lot of technical founders who are looking for a non-technical co-founder specifically. They want somebody with a marketing or a sales background. Because of that communication piece, you can have the best idea in the world. But if you can’t communicate what it is to an investor, you aren’t going to get funding. If you can’t communicate that in a business plan, you’re not going to get a grant or you’re not going to be able to take out a loan from a bank. All of those things center around good communication and sometimes that’s verbal and sometimes that’s visual, and sometimes it’s a blend of both. And I think that having the art and writing skill sets, if you will, as I mentioned, that’s that’s my background having those are more important sometimes than being able to actually do the execution of the coding. Now a successful startup has both. If you are a technical product, you need it to work, but you also need to be able to make it visually appealing. User experience and user design is built around what are the intuitive paths for people, for your customers, for your users, for utilizing your service, your product. Because if it’s too hard or too complicated, they won’t use it. That’s one of the reasons that iPhones go over so well, and that’s one of the reasons that people with toddlers have their toddlers swiping. And because it’s intuitive, they understand how an iPhone works and it makes sense to them in a way that something that was very technical would not.

Lee Kantor: [00:18:27] So what’s your favorite part about mentoring startups and entrepreneurs and early stage folks?

Aly Merritt: [00:18:33] Oh gosh. The passion that people have for these different segments of life that I didn’t even know existed. Being a startup, being a startup entrepreneur and running with something that is so important to you is incredibly moving. It’s inspirational. I love talking to entrepreneurs who have put everything that they have behind this really amazing idea because it’s important to them that they see a problem and a solution for that problem and they want to share it and make life better. So many entrepreneurs see a problem that they had and they want to figure out how to keep other people from having to experience that problem. They want to fix it for somebody else. And it’s a very interestingly altruistic motive in many ways. I had this issue and I don’t want anybody else to have to face that issue. Let’s fix it.

Lee Kantor: [00:19:22] Yeah, I think generosity is at the heart of a lot of. Nors and and and I don’t know if the layperson understands that or appreciates that.

Aly Merritt: [00:19:31] Well, I think entrepreneurs are if you’re not in the startup and tech community, you view entrepreneurs as the extremely successful people that, you know, that have come out of a startup space. But there’s so much more than that. Those extremely successful people, by the time you see them, there’s money involved. And so they see it as what, you started a startup to get money, which is great. We all like money. It provides many wonderful things in our lives. But a lot of startups don’t become the uber successful and I mean that level. They’re not Uber, they’re not going to be the next even part of it, but they are going to be something that changes lives in a different way, even if it’s just the lives of the team that’s working on that product, right?

Lee Kantor: [00:20:13] Or the family of the entrepreneur or the community where that family lives. I mean, the lifestyle.

Aly Merritt: [00:20:19] Small businesses are extremely respectable business model. There is no reason that you have to look at your business and think, How do I scale this internationally?

Lee Kantor: [00:20:28] Amen to that. Now, how did you find out about Startup Showdown?

Aly Merritt: [00:20:34] So this is a completely shameless plug for the former LAUGHTER Network, because Tammy McQueen, the VP of marketing at Panoramic, is a former lady. Laughter at heart or all kind of still offers. And she is one of the most amazing and dynamic marketing professionals I have ever met. She has vision that she communicates beautifully and she creates these wonderful experiences. So when she mentioned that she was doing this new startup showcase concept, I kept thinking, That sounds really fun. And I bet if Tammy is behind it, it’s going to be a really amazing scale. It’s going to really provide something that changes the lives of entrepreneurs. I’ve run a lot of startup events and startup pitch events. I’ve helped at a lot of them. But Startup Showdown is providing an enormous amount of capital in a very real number that makes a difference for the winning companies. $100,000 every month is what they’re giving away, if not more. And that is a significant number that can really take a startup from where it is to very far down the line in the next level. So when Tammy mentioned it, I immediately said, I would love to help, how can I help? And she asked very graciously if I would help mentor some of the startups. And of course I said yes, because how can I not? So I did two rounds of startup mentoring for Startup Showdown.

Lee Kantor: [00:21:58] Now, any advice for Startup Founder that’s listening right now? Like what would be kind of your do’s and don’ts?

Aly Merritt: [00:22:06] Oh, gosh, I have so much advice. Let me try and truncate that. The first thing is, is you should know the people in your industry, especially people locally. I’ve seen a lot of different entrepreneurs, you know, somebodies name or the company they’re with. They don’t recognize them visually and they will miss an opportunity to chat with them at an event that they both happen to be at. No know who your target audience is, know who your investors are, know who the people that are in your industry, they’re doing great things. Ah, and then I would, I always say this to everybody, regardless of startup, whether you’re a startup entrepreneur or just a person, is have conversations with people without looking for what you’re going to get out of it, ask how you can help them. Is there something you can provide that would help them drive their dream forward regardless of what it does for you? Because one, that’s the right thing to do. And two, it creates a trust and a network in a different fashion than just something that’s built over the monetary impact that you can have on somebody’s company.

Lee Kantor: [00:23:09] Well, Ali, thank you so much for sharing your story today. If somebody wants to connect with you at Tech Village or learn more about the events or just some of the opportunity there, what’s a website?

Aly Merritt: [00:23:20] Yes, Atlanta Tech Village dot com, all spelled out.

Lee Kantor: [00:23:23] Well, thank you again for sharing your story. You’re doing important work and we appreciate you.

Aly Merritt: [00:23:28] Thank you so much, Lee. I appreciate you having me on today.

Lee Kantor: [00:23:30] All right. This is Lee Kantor. We’ll see you next time on Startup Showdown.

Speaker2: [00:23:36] As always, thanks for joining us. And don’t forget to follow and subscribe to the Startup Showdown podcast. So you get the latest episode as it drops wherever you listen to podcasts to learn more and apply to our next startup Showdown Pitch Competition Visit Showdown VC. That’s Showdown Dot VC. All right, that’s all for this week. Goodbye for now.