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The news site of Santa Barbara City College.

The Channels

The news site of Santa Barbara City College.

The Channels

Harvard alumn invests in entrepreneurs

Dr.+Anton+introduces+students+to+the+Enterprise+Launch+program+at+9+a.m.+in+the+IDC+Building-Room+211.
Øystein Grønvold
Dr. Anton introduces students to the Enterprise Launch program at 9 a.m. in the IDC Building-Room 211.

Students with innovative ideas can get the help they need to launch a product or service at the City College Enterprise Launch program.

Enterprise Launch is a Student in Free Enterprise (SIFE) project run by the entrepreneurial student club. Enterprise Launch meets at 9 a.m. every Friday in the IDC Building-Room 211.

The program is funded by a donation from Dr. Jon Anton, Harvard doctorate and former researcher at Purdue University, who started 19 companies throughout his career.

“The world has been good to me and before I retired I was able to make a chunk of money and you can’t take it with you,” Dr. Anton said. “I’m good at entrepreneuring and I asked the school if I could get involved with the students.”

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The club is a place where students get help creating prototypes, obtaining patents and launching products and services.

“I think this is a great opportunity to gain some real world experience,” said creative writing major Shauna Merphy. “I have always been interested in entrepreneuring and this is an amazing free service the college offers for us students.”

This is the Enterprise Launch program’s third semester at City College. All the mentors and faculty members are entrepreneurs themselves and offer their time for free. The leader of the group is Melissa Moreno, director of the Scheinfeld Center.

“This is really our playground for ideas,” Moreno said. “We have a diverse mix of students and that’s fun.”

Only half of the 33 attending students at the first September 7 meeting were business majors. Almost every seat in the room was taken and the students wanted to skip the breaks to be able to hear more.

“This is a great opportunity to get experience and to work with people who’ve done this before and are experts in their field,” Moreno said. ”We’ve had a lot of successful students in this club.”

When joining the club every member has to sign a non-disclosure agreement (NDA), a legal document that says you can’t “steal” someone’s ideas.

“Anything you share or hear in this room is a secret and you can’t tell it to anyone,” said Moreno. “This is a safe place for ideas.”

Dr. Anton engaged the students in brainstorming of new products and services during the workshop.

“America is all about the entrepreneurial spirit,” Dr. Anton said. “We need persons with that mentalityThe teachers are here to mentor students and to possibly invest in their ideas. Last year Dr. Anton invested in three projects.

“In these bright minds there must be an idea worth investing in and even if I don’t earn a penny I’d still be happy because I love doing this,” Dr. Anton said. “Some people might take this club, discover a product, quit school, and start working with their idea.”

Sept. 14 is the last day to join the group.

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