This post was written for and first published on the Knight Foundation's blog.
By Michael D. Bolden
A Miami Beach company with deep roots in managing assisted living facilities won first prize in a pitch competition staged Sunday night at The Lab Miami in Wynwood by an accelerator trying to give startups a boost toward success.
Mia Senior Living Solutions principal Pilar Bretos Carvajal said she attended the NewME pop-up accelerator to practice her message as the company, which was founded 17 years ago by Carvajal’s mother, Conchy Bretos, tries to “move the ship.”
“Our business model in the past has consisted of setting up and managing these assisted living facilities on behalf of owners,” she said. “We have had short-term contracts and handed the facilities over to the owner once the contract expired. We realize now that we cannot control the quality of the product in this fashion so we are changing our business model to own and operate the facilities.”
“I wasn’t expecting anything like this,” Carvajal said, after NewME founder Angela Benton announced that Mia Senior Living Solutions had won $46,625 in prizes.
The award package includes server and software services, a chance to pitch to Google Ventures and a space next year at NewME’s residential accelerator in San Francisco. The accelerator’s core service is a 12-week entrepreneurial immersion program for groups underrepresented in the tech industry, such as women, Latinos and African-Americans.
It was the second year of the NewME accelerator program in Miami, which Knight Foundation first brought to South Florida in November. “Miami really is a special place,” Benton said. “You have so much momentum.”
The event, which began Thursday night with a dinner hosted by Knight, included private coaching from experienced entrepreneurs and lessons on building presentation skills from communications coach Anthony L. Hogan.
Hogan, who held workshops for the teams Friday and Saturday nights, told the participants that they had to emulate eagles, with “the ability to fly above the storms.”
“You have to start thinking, ‘I’m an entrepreneur. I’m not like an average person,’” he said.
Demo night capped the weekend, with 38 companies pitching their ideas to a panel of four judges. The teams ranged from one-person shops refining pitches for a few thousand dollars to hire developers to mature companies like Mia Senior Living Solutions coordinating a message around the millions they need to diversify or scale their businesses.
Two teams tied for second place and each won packages worth $37,000: #HASH, which is developing “untraceable multiplatform messaging”; and Portbox, which is developing a real-time availability calendar with automated booking for the modeling industry. A third-place award of $22,000 in services and products went to Jurnid, a publishing, reading and advocacy news platform.