Your Chief Penguin
My name is Melissa Sassi, and I’m IBM Z’s Chief Penguin. I head up Student & Entrepreneur Experience globally within the IBM Z division of IBM. I also have the pleasure of being the Mother of IBM Hyper Protect Accelerator.
#Road2100 Startups
I joined IBM in early 2019 from Microsoft where I was an impact investor focused on the internet and energy access spaces and brought digital skills to the newly connected. I became an IBMer to create a new startup program for our Systems business…the organization where IBM Z resides. We currently have 45 startups that have been welcomed into our Accelerator, and this year is what we are calling our #RoadTo100. Yes, 100 startups!
We are currently scouting for fintech, digital assets, healthtech, and insurtech startups with less than $1M in revenue and less than five years old. Ideally, our startups should already be at the MVP (Minimum Viable Product) stage and ideally in GA (General Availability). As part of the program, we provide $10K month in IBM Cloud credits for a one year period, where all startups have an opportunity to gain access to up to $120,000 in IBM Cloud credits over that one year timeline.
We are seeing some amazing startups come through the application pool and are incredibly excited to welcome founders from across the globe (YES, the program is global!) to apply to the Accelerator. What more do startups receive? One year of business mentorship from Village Capital, our social good startup accelerator partner, as well as two years of technical mentorship that’s managed by our amazing Chief Technical Penguin, Aaron Ralls. In addition startups receive GTM support, marketing and PR collaboration, and much, much more that enables startups to collaborate with IBM and our vast network of customers and ecosystem partners.
If you have not checked out the application page, you can find it here.
Doing Well While Doing Good
Why am I passionate about technology entrepreneurship and the startup ecosystem? Well, for me, it is all about reducing the world’s inequalities, empowering more women and girls to become the creators and makers and doers of tomorrow through boosting entrepreneurial spirit and innovation across key industry verticals, and solving the UN Sustainable Development Goals.
I am incredibly passionate about the role that technology plays to transform people from consumers of technology into creators, makers, and doers empowered by technology +++ bringing big tech along with people along their entrepreneurship journey. As a Founder myself, I thought about what a startup founder and/or CTO might want out of a big tech company, and this is where the journey to creating our Accelerator began. I know how much I have struggled with my own hustle and made it my IBM mission to solve many of the challenges I have faced and continue to face as a founder. While it’s hard to fit the needs of each, individual startup in a program of this nature, who doesn’t want to go to business together with one of the largest tech companies on the planet while considering the right approach for data protection, privacy, and security with experts across the industry to guide a startup’s journey from building to scaling?!
Join us to showcase that data privacy is a human right by protecting your data with the most secure server on the planet and start your journey to scale with our crew at IBM Hyper Protect Accelerator.
Startups with Sassi & Ralls
Learn from other startup founders and CTOs about their journeys instead of hearing it from me. You can do so by registering for Startups with Sassi & Ralls...a biweekly livestream that occurs every other Wednesday from 12PM – 12:30PM EST. Register here for the platform and mark your calendar!
Cohorts 2 & 3
Want to learn about our past two cohorts, click here & do not forget to register as a member of the Accelerator Hub!
Be a Guest Blogger
Want to write a guest blog in our Hub? Use the discussion tab to volunteer & we will come back to you to coordinate your blog. What should it include? Anything and everything startups, data security, or anything else that might be relevant to your founder story or journey to become an entrepreneur.
See you on the Hub!
Dr. Melissa Sassi
Chief Penguin, IBM
@mentorafrika