University of Notre Dame ESTEEM “Startup Salon”

Band member Richard Pivnicka, Honorary Consul General of the Czech Republic, on March 14th hosted a “Startup Salon” at AutoVino in Menlo Park for 50 Masters in Entrepreneurship and MBA students from his alma mater University of Notre Dame. In Notre Dame’s 11-month entrepreneurship program – ESTEEM – students learn not only about startups in general but specifically about the commercialization of innovative science, engineering, and technology discoveries and innovations. Ian Sobieski, Chairman of the Band of Angels, interviewed Marc Tarpenning, co-founder of Tesla Motors, educator, and role model. Other prominent guests invited to converse with the graduate students included Whit Diffie, winner of the $1m Turing Prize, the “Nobel" of computer science, and, Dr. Ramesh Raskar, Director of MIT Camera Labs and winner of the $500,000 Lemelson Award.