THE
BOOK Fall 2017
The Book • Fall 2017
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Credits Editor-in-Chief: Scott Henderson Managing Editor: Rachel Zick Designer: Mika Munch Photography: Jared Serfozo Reviewer: Nona Dowling Thank you to our student and non-profit program partners, Code for Atlanta, HackGT, Startup Exchange, GT Bits of Good, andTEDxGeorgiaTech, who help bring energy, enthusiasm, and great ideas to life. Special shout out to every Sandbox ATL member who attended an event, hosted a Power Meal, contributed media content, or shared their research/startup/passions this season. Your contributions make the Sandbox ATL community and Tech Square better.
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The Book • Fall 2017
Thank you.
We are truly defined by our partnerships. Sandbox ATL is the collaboration platform for Tech Square. Everything we do is focused on creating connections that fuel commerce. None of it would be possible without the support of our amazing partners. Each of these organizations share our belief that breakthroughs do not occur in a vacuum. Rather, they are the natural outcome of bringing bright minds from different disciplines together to learn from, inspire, and collaborate with each other. All of what you are about to read came about because of their support and leadership.
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The frenzy of Fall is a fun time for everyone at Tech Square. New first year students flooding campus mingling with the grizzled veterans of the GT academic grind bring an excitement of unlimited opportunities and new possibilities. Maybe it’s the milder weather and bright leaves. Or maybe it’s the impending end of the calendar year. Whatever the reason, Fall is a naturally busy season filled with events, conferences, and festivals at Tech Square and across Atlanta. Not surprisingly, we put a healthy focus in the Fall on student programs, helping them prepare for the job search and standing out at Tech Square Job Fair events. All of this made possible by our intrepid volunteer mentors from a variety of Tech Square companies and organizations. Somehow, Sandbox ATL and our partners found a number of ways to shoehorn more opportunities for people to create connections. Laced throughout the season were the MARTA Hackathon, Hump Day Exchange episodes, Show&Tell: BuiltTech, Snack Attacks, Harvest Fest, and Holiday Parties galore. Personally, Fall is my favorite season of the year. Hope you enjoy reading about the connections created. Scott Henderson Editor-in-Chief
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The Book • Fall 2017
What's Inside What is Tech Square? What is Sandbox ATL? Spectacles Park(ing) Day Board Game Night North+ Northside Harvest Fest Holiday in the Square Making Connections Hump Day Exchange: Global Tech Hubs Show & Tell: BuiltTech Tech Square Job Fair Marta Hackathon Series Student Programs Community
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What is Tech Square? Tech Square is the heart of Atlanta's tech scene and filled with breakthrough talent, breakthrough ideas, and breakthrough companies. Located in Midtown Atlanta, Tech Square has the highest density of startups, corporate innovators, academic researchers, and students in the entire southeastern United States. Seven startup accelerators, over 100 startups, seventeen corporate innovation centers, ten research labs, ten Top 10 engineering programs, one Top 10 MBA program, and over 1,300 Georgia Tech students call Tech Square home. TechSquareATL.com tells the stories of Tech Square, featuring fresh content each week.
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The Book • Fall 2017
What is Sandbox ATL? Sandbox ATL is the collaboration platform for Tech Square. We create connections that fuel commerce. With the help of our partners and over 1,200 members, we offer: Community Programs: Power Meals, Tech Square Job Fair, and Sandbox Academy Collaborative Workspace: The Garage Compelling Content: Telling the stories of the neighborhood on TechSquareATL.com
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EVENTS 9/15 - Park(ing) Day 10/17 - Board Game Night 10/25 - North + Northside Harvest
Fest
11/29 - 11/30 - Holiday Decorating
Sessions
12/7 - Tech Square Holiday Party 12/14 - North+Northside Holiday
Party
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D AT E
TIME
September 15, 2017
11 AM - 3 PM
L O C AT I O N
PA R T N E R S
Fifth Street and Tech GT Student Planning Assoc Square Plaza + Georgia Power + Southern Company
park(ing) day 10 T h e B o o k • F a l l 2 0 1 7
Tech Square celebrates this annual open-source global event where folks temporarily transform metered parking spaces into public places. This year’s festivities included a graffiti wall, Rubix cube competition, yoga and meditation spot, and game room complete with foosball, cornhole, and Plinko. The event coincided with National Drive Electric Week, and what better way to celebrate than giving away a free electric car? Sofia Carpenter was the very lucky winner of a Nissan Leaf, sponsored by Southern Company and Georgia
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parklets created
free food & drink samples
lucky winner of an electric vehicle
Power.
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D AT E
TIME
October 17, 2017
4:30 - 7:30 PM
L O C AT I O N
PA R T N E R S
Centergy Lobby Lounge
ATDC
board game night 12 T h e B o o k • F a l l 2 0 1 7
Sandbox ATL teamed up with ATDC to host Board Game Night in the Centergy Lobby Lounge. Both veterans and n00bs were welcomed, thanks to seasoned Game Masters who were on hand to show novices the ropes. With games ranging from Ticket to Ride to Sushi Go Party!, there was tabletop fun to suit every taste.
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attendees
games going in parallel play
sheep herded in a game of Catan
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D AT E
TIME
October 25, 2017
11am – 1:30pm
L O C AT I O N
PA R T N E R S
Technology Enterprise Park
TUFF + Gateway
north + northside harvest fest 14 T h e B o o k • F a l l 2 0 1 7
Harvest Fest 2017 was a celebration of something bigger than the turning of the seasons. The double treat of a Blue Ribbon Competition for makers and bakers and Food Cart Midway featuring Doggy Doggy and Cult Carts was just the appetizer. The main course was a Half-Mile Charity Walk on a pop-up walking path connecting the North Avenue Research Area (NARA) and Technology Enterprise Park (TEP). Local nonprofit Chris 180 was the beneficiary of this charity walk.
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food carts
mile charity walk
Grand Marshall leadingtheprocession
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D AT E
TIME
Various
Various
L O C AT I O N
PA R T N E R S
Lobby Lounge,The Garage, + The Gathering Spot
TUFF + Gateway
holidays in the square 16 T h e B o o k • F a l l 2 0 1 7
Tech Square went all out this holiday season. The revelry included collaborative, multi-day decorating sessions; a gingerbread competition; snowflake crafts; and the largest gathering of the startup, web, entrepreneur, and tech communities in the city. Yep, we’re talking three parties and
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gingerbread houses
giant papier-mâché ornaments
multiple crafting confabulations--all in the name of spreading good cheer.
456
totalseasonrevelers
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EVENTS 9/8 - 9/9 - MARTA Hackathon: Rider Experience Design 9/27 - Hump Day Exchange: Global Tech Hubs 10/2 - Show&Tell: BuiltTech 10/3 - FinTech Bridge Pitch Competition 10/7 - STE(A)M Truck Gala 11/1 - Hump Day Exchange: The Student Hustle 11/8 - Tech Square Job Fair 12/5 - Show&Tell: Data
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making connections T h e B o o k • F a l l 2 0 1 7 19
D AT E
TIME
September 27, 2017
5 - 7 PM
L O C AT I O N
PA R T N E R S
The Garage
ATDC
hump day exchange: global tech hubs 20 T h e B o o k • F a l l 2 0 1 7
Cities rise from commerce. Knowing you can’t copy or recreate another’s success (but can emulate it), there seems to be a reformulation of approaches for the next wave of global tech hubs. Those who focus on their strengths and comparative advantages will rise. So who’s on the rise? That’s what we explored in this episode, featuring Adora Cheung from Y Combinator, Grant Wainscott from the Metro Atlanta Chamber, and Dave Williams from NomadX in Lisbon.
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Forbes’ ranking of Atlanta among the next ‘tech meccas’ Adora Cheung’s age when she became CEO of Homejoy
Guest live from Lisbon
“AMERICA MISSES OUT ON GREAT ENTREPRENEURS WHO CAN’T COME HERE BECAUSE OF IMMIGRATION ISSUES.” Adora Cheung Partner at Y Combinator
“THE #1 THING FOR COMPANIES IS TO FOCUS ON A SEGMENT AND BECOME AN EXPERT IN THAT MARKET.” Dave Williams CEO and Co-Founder, NomadX
“ATLANTA’S STORY ISN’T WRITTEN YET. YOU CAN STILL COME HERE AND MAKE YOUR MARK.” Grant Wainscott Senior Director of Technology Ecosystem Expansion, Metro Atlanta Chamber
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D AT E
TIME
October 2, 2017
11 AM - 1 PM
L O C AT I O N
PA R T N E R S
The Garage
Honeywell + Georgia Center of Innovation - IT
show&tell: builttech 22 T h e B o o k • F a l l 2 0 1 7
Show&Tell is Tech Square’s quarterly science fair-style demo day, which focuses on a different emerging technology each time. October’s theme was BuiltTech. This
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BuiltTech-focused companies
$217 trillion sector is what shapes the future of planning, design, construction, and management of buildings, infrastructure, and cities. Pointivo, Konstru, Cognosos, Imbibe, Flourish Technologies, Quest Renewables, 3D Printing Technologies, and thyssenkrupp all exhibited
their BuiltTech technologies while Bill Wilkins of Pointivo, K.P. Reddy of The Combine and Shadow Ventures, Sand-
eep Ahuja of Pattern r+d, and Dennis Shelden of Georgia Tech’s Digital Building Lab presented their predictions for
minutes of Fast Forward talk insights
trillion dollars of annual investment needed to close the globalinfrastructure gap
BuiltTech in the next five years.
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D AT E
TIME
November 8, 2017
1 - 5 PM
L O C AT I O N
PA R T N E R S
The Garage
ATDC + ChooseATL + The Home Depot
tech square job fair 24 T h e B o o k • F a l l 2 0 1 7
From scrappy startups to global giants, breakthrough companies in Tech Square are always looking to hire breakthrough talent. The Tech Square Job Fair sets the stage for employers and job seekers to have real conversations in a relaxed setting. This fall, for the first time ever, exhibitors had access to a custom app that streamlined the follow-up process making it easier than ever to connect with their favorite potential candidates.
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job seekers
universities represented
company + job seeker double matches
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EVENTS 2016 10/28 - 10/29 - Ridership Data 2017 2/24 - 2/25 - SmartCities & IoT 6/8 - Civic Tech Summit 9/8 - 9/9 - Rider Experience Design
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MARTA Hackathon Series T h e B o o k • F a l l 2 0 1 7 27
D AT E
TIME
October 2016 – 2017
Various
L O C AT I O N
PA R T N E R S
The Garage
MARTA + Code for Atlanta + HackGT
building the next great thing in atlanta transit 28 T h e B o o k • F a l l 2 0 1 7
Last fall, MARTA embarked on a new strategic initiative: Partnering with Atlanta’s tech community to create the
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hours spent hacking
next great thing in Atlanta transit. Over the course of the year, MARTA and its partners hosted three 24-hour hackathons, with the addition of a Civic Tech Summit in June to discuss responses and solutions after the I-85 bridge collapse. For the first time ever, MARTA opened its data sets to the public to empower hackers to help improve
the rider experience. By collaborating with the tech community, MARTA greatly expanded its network to enable continued growth beyond this one year experiment.
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total participants
projects turned into real-worldsolutions
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civic hacking MARTA Hackers came from a variety of backgrounds and disciplines. Here’s a look at the most common skillsets.
So what exactly is civic hacking? We asked the expert. “Civic hacking is when people work together on civic-minded social good projects in a quick and innovative way,” explained Luigi Ray-Montanez. He’s co-director of Code for Atlanta, a local brigade of Code for America. Want to learn more? They hosts civic hack nights twice a month, including one right here in Tech Square.
Policy Wonk - 84
UX Designer - 370
Software Developer - 744
Data Analyst - 322
Other - 617 Project Manager - 296 Subject Matter Expert - 200
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The best thing about MARTA Hack? It brought the tech community together around a common mission: improving Atlanta’s transit. Three cheers for the local organizations that played a pivotal role in its success!
impact Expanding community
Improving mobile technology
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Winning Teams Ridership Data
Smart Cities & IoT
1. Increase ridership on MARTA 2. ImprovetheriderexperienceonMARTA
Sponsored Challenges: 1. Smart Parking Solutions for MARTA 2. Smart Wayfinding Solutions 3. Smart Trash Collection Solutions 4. Data Sets 5. Curbside Pickup 6. North Ave Visualization 7. Smart Parking for City of Atlanta
Bankhead
Oct 28-29 MyBreeze Leverages NFC phone capabilities to quickly manage Breeze card payments for the whole family.
Fe 24 Last Mile? No Problem! A mobile app providing rideshare availability estimates near any MARTA station.
Gar
West En
Oaklan
Lakewo 32 T h e B o o k • F a l l 2 0 1 7
Arts Center
Rider Experience Design
Midtown North Avenue Civic Center Peachtree Center
1. Improve the rider experience between two stations 2. Inform the MARTA mobile app roadmap 3. Help riders view all aspects of MARTA as a viable alternative
eb 4-25
rnett
nd
nd City
ood
Sep 8-9 Ideation category: NAVigators Improving the design language of station signage and wayfinding. Implementation category: Go/No-Go Helping customers afraid of unreliable service make a more informed decision about whether MARTA will get them to their destination on time. T h e B o o k • F a l l 2 0 1 7 33
EVENTS 9/19 - Working with StrengthsFinder 9/26 - Goal Setting, Goal Achieving 10/3 - Maximizing Your Digital Presence 10/10 - Acing the Interview 11/6 - Tech Square Job Fair VIP Preview 11/8 - Tech Square Job Fair
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Student Programs T h e B o o k • F a l l 2 0 1 7 35
D AT E
TIME
September – November 2017
Various
L O C AT I O N
PA R T N E R S
The Garage
SQ5 + ATDC
refining breakthrough talent 36 T h e B o o k • F a l l 2 0 1 7
Many of Tech Square’s corporate innovation denizens cite access to breakthrough talent as a chief motivator to set up digs in the neighborhood. But don’t take our word for it. “Tech Square is a great opportunity to connect with top tech talent,” says Nicole Jones, global innovation leader at Delta Airlines. This semester, Sandbox ATL partnered with SQ5, a student living community, to help
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corporate innovation centers hungry for tech talent
weeks of career prep workshops
those talented students sharpen their professional skills and prepare for life after graduation.
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job seeker resumes submitted at TechSquareJobFair. com
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This fall, Sandbox offered students a series of five workshops designed to prepare them to make the most of the season’s biggest event: the Tech Square Job Fair. Each workshop was designed to equip students with the skills they needed to find and land the job of their dreams.
SESSION 1: FINDING YOUR STRENGTHS SEPTEMBER 19 Terri Kelly, a certified Gallup StrengthsFinder coach, shared insight with students on understanding the unique assets and talents within. Mentors dug deeper into the students’ purpose in order to streamline their success.
SESSION 2: GOALSET TING, GOAL ACHIEVING SEPTEMBER 26 Want to get stuff done? Write it down! Ed Rieker guided everyone through a short- and long-term goal setting exercise, sharing how the simple act of writing down goals sets you on the path of making them come true.
S E S S I O N 3 : A M P L I F Y I N G Y O U R D I G I TA L OC TOBER 3 In this workshop, Roger Lopez taught students to present themselves better online and IRL. This high octane evening included lessons on leveling up your LinkedIn profile and learning how to stand out from the masses in your job search.
SESSION 4: ACING THE INTERVIEW OC TOBER 10 It all come down to this - practicing for that job interview! Mentors and students conducted speed interviews to practice some of the toughest questions likely to arise in a job interview. Even if its awkward, preparation is key!
T E C H S Q U A R E J O B FA I R V I P P R E V I E W NOVEMBER 6
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This event featured a hands-on presentation by Kurt Ronn, founder of HRWorks.com and former talent adviser to Fortune 500 companies. He shared three secrets to making the most of job fairs and a simple, ready-to-use framework for mapping your resume to your dream job.
In addition to designing programs for students, Sandbox ATL partners with four student organizations whose missions align with Sandbox’s vision for creating connections that fuel commerce. The leaders of these four groups embody the grit and hustle that defines the next generation of breakthrough talent. Bits of Good connects nonprofits with talented student developers to advance their social missions. Teams spend the semester working with a local nonprofit to develop new software with the goal of delivering a functional product at the end of the semester.
HackGT is a registered 501(c)4 nonprofit dedicated to promoting computer science education. They organize events for college and high school students ranging from small scale workshops to the marquee 1200+ student hackathon every fall.
“Being a student is more than just going to class and earning a degree. It’s about discovering your passions and using your experiences to make an impact.”
“Participating in Hackathons is very empowering; It keeps us inspired to keep creating.”
Andre Hijaouy VP of Operations
Lekha Surasani Director of Finance and Operations
TEDxGeorgiaTech is run entirely by student volunteers. Their goal is to showcase ideas from their own community that inspire change on Georgia Tech campus and beyond.
Startup Exchange is the largest student entrepreneurial community at Georgia Tech. They support and inspire Georgia Tech students to create and develop their ventures.
“Students just want to be known for who they are and what they can do. They want to feel challenged but also equipped..”
“It’s important for students to develop their creative muscle, and not be so career-focused.”
Chloe Belangia Executive Director
Wesley Samples Co-Director
K U R T R O N N ’ S 3 T I P S F O R J O B FA I R S U C C E S S
1. Apply online – it’s technically illegal to interview on the spot.
2. Use the company’s own vernacular to cater your resume to them.
3. Answer questions clearly using the formula: Situation, Action, Result. T h e B o o k • F a l l 2 0 1 7 39
The best thing about being part of Tech Square is the instant access to a robust network of entrepreneurs, technologists, and more. These faces represent the breakthrough talent behind every door in this neighborhood. This ever-expanding collection of Tech Square Trading Cards is one small step to break those doors wide open. Next time you see one of these folks, stop to say hi. You never know what may come of it.
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Sandbox ATL is the collaboration platform for Tech Square. We create connections that fuel commerce. Want to learn more? Email hello@sandboxatl.com
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