Portland Ten launching new incubator program, charges entrepreneurs $1500

Re:Portland Ten launching new incubator program, charges ent... by nickb on Wednesday February 11, 2009 @05:25PM (#477642)

[We’re looking for] an entrepreneur right on the cusp of starting a high-growth business. A teachable entrepreneur who will commit to the required activities, and the optional activities when possible. An entrepreneur who will consider themselves the first investor in the project and raise the funds to pay the $500/month program tuition.

Huh? They should be paying THEM to participate! What value-add do they actually provide? If they're mentoring, what credentials do they have? From what I can see, they interview you and tell you your idea/product sucks or rocks and either boost or crush your ego. Is that all? You can find a desk in some quiet office for less than that amount and hack something out on your own and let the market tell you if your product is any good.

They don't even say if they're taking any equity for this 'service' that they're providing... but they must be. They also don't say how exactly they'll find your project once your own funding runs out. They're throwing the $1M figure around but they're not saying that they'll be actually providing you with that amount of funding or they expect you to make $1M by then end of 2010. My guess is the latter.

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Re:Portland Ten launching new incubator program, charges ent... by timf on Wednesday February 11, 2009 @05:44PM (#477668)

They are not taking equity, looks more like a consulting firm.

"we don't invest capital" @ http://portlandten.wordpress.com/about/

"Portland Ten is a Y-Combinator-like incubator for high tech startups in Portland, Oregon, with one caveat– we don’t invest capital; we train entrepreneurs to get things done without it, and attract the necessary funds or resources as a result."

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Re:Portland Ten launching new incubator program, charges ent... by pg on Wednesday February 11, 2009 @05:58PM (#477688)

That's a rather big caveat. I wonder how they train people not to eat.

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Re:Portland Ten launching new incubator program, charges ent... by nickb on Wednesday February 11, 2009 @08:02PM (#477826)

Meditation! I hear some Indian Yogi don't eat for months.

But seriously, they're getting very little for this "tuition." Unless they have Bill Gates, Vinod Khosla or Marc Andreessen mentoring them, I wouldn't pay a dime.

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Re:Portland Ten launching new incubator program, charges ent... by Alex3917 on Wednesday February 11, 2009 @08:22PM (#477845)

$500 a month isn't bad if it's going to pay for lunch, books, field trips, and group work space.

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