Tom Niermann, CEO of Achieve Communication, was the keynote speaker at the SPICE series on Monday, February 25. In his interactive presentation, Mr. Niermann discussed the difficulties that many experience in their entrepreneurial journey. He also talked about the qualifications and resources one needs to create his/her own startup. “Mr. Niermann gave an interesting perspective on how to approach a start-up as a hypothesis and test it. His method for developing a compelling pitch to investors to make the idea a reality is very useful for me,” said iScholar Jacob Howenstein. In the first 14 years of his career, Mr. Niermann founded three venture-backed software startups in three different markets in the valley. Two of these were bought by public companies. Tom was most recently the Head of Technology and Program Management for Google’s direct partners worldwide. Tom is an active member of the St. Louis Arch Angels, and is currently starting a mobile application company. Speakers Pioneering Innovation, Creativity and Entrepreneurship (SPICE) is a free ongoing speaker event to enhance the flavor of engineering education by bringing technology visionaries into direct contact with students and practitioners. The goal of SPICE is to influence the ecosystem by bringing role models in to educate the charms and challenges in realizing breakthrough innovations. SPICE is funded by the Kern Entrepreneurship Education Network (KEEN). KEEN is a collaboration of 19 universities around the U.S. that strive to instill an entrepreneurial mindset in undergraduate engineering students. KEEN’s mission is to “graduate engineers who will contribute to business success, and in doing so, transform the American workforce.”
