Ali Kermani only has a minute.
At the moment, the serial entrepreneur is running two different companies that he's launched. One of them is Acoustic Productions, a video production company that started out producing "assembly videos" -- as in "if you need help putting together that thing you just bought, watch this video and we'll take you through it step by step." He's just hired a production manager to help him run things.
He's also just launched a sales rep group aimed at skate shops and other independent retail entitities. The idea is a simple on: There a a lot of companies that would like to get their products on their shelves in your local skate, surf or bike shop but it's not worth their time to go after them; it's more cost-effective to seek out the big chains who place million dollar orders. Kermani -- whose lifelong dream of becoming a professional skater was derailed by injury -- and his team get them that access.
On top of it all, he's working full-time for Razor, the company that bought his prior entrepreneurial venture, the Drift Cart. And that's where the Knapp Venture Competition comes in.
Ali Kermani and Prof. Bill Cockrum test pilot the Drift Cart around Alumni Plaza
Kermani enrolled at UCLA Anderson with a goal of turning his idea for a motorized drift cart into a business. (You can read all the details about how that came to fruition, including a second-place finish in the Knapp Competition and winning the $15,000 Wolfen Entrepreneurial Fellowship Award here.)
Kermani says that the Knapp experience was much more than just the final presentations (the 2011 Finals are tonight.) "There were multiple rounds and after every round I got critiques and so much of that was valuable feedback," Kermani said. "Then there were the connections I made. One judge introduced me to someone from Mattel. Another suggested I go to UCLA's engineering department and I ended up connecting with two undergraduate engineering students and the three of us came up with ideas that made the ideas that made production more viable and brought costs down."
Kermani ultimately sold the Drift Cart to Razor (a company he worked for before coming to Anderson), who then hired him on to work on Drift Cart where when he isnt' testing new products he's flyng to China to check on Drift Cart production.
"I wouldnt be where I'm at today if it wasn't for the Knapp Competition," Kermani told us yesterday. "the competition turned my dream into reality."
See whose dreams become reality tonight at the Knapp Venture Competition Finals.
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