And let me also thank Life Pilot, Microsoft, InfusionSoft,, the Business Journal, and EmpowHer for their major sponsorships in this difficult year.  A whole host of in-kind sponsors, listed on the event site, also helped make this possible.

A few highlights for me (I didn’t see everything): Kevin Surace’s excellent keynote on green building and its role in America’s competitiveness; Merlin Mann’s admonition that we check our email every five minutes because we can’t stand uncertainty, not because there’s anything important; Michelle Robson’s courageous slide of her first company name and logo; an incredibly good panel on health care entrepreneurship consisting of three doctors who see what’s wrong with the system and are working to fix it; Tara Hunt, Joan, and me singing an original song made up by a fan of Tara’s; and Dan Gillmor helping Mary Kay Reinhart of the Arizona Guardian move from old to new media.

And today I got a note in the mail from a man I know from the gym. He’s 94, and a retired entrepreneur himself. The handwritten note says: “this cheeseball wants to support your Foundation,” and enclosed was a check for $50. This was a response to a blog post I wrote while planning the conference complaining about the lack of community support for entrepreneurship. Clearly, I was wrong.

Each year, entrepreneurs who can’t attend themselves have the opportunity to sponsor a student.

(Simply click REGISTER) and select “Sponsor a Student”.

Each student is asked to complete a short essay after the event on their Three Best Take Aways from AZEC09 and share it with their sponsor.

Here’s what one student said:

Today was great!!! I had such an amazing time. Meant plenty of people and learned plenty of things. I took 10 pages of notes throughout the day and I am still processing all the rest of the information.

Three best takeaways

1. Pam Slim stood out to me as the biggest influence of the conference. For the last year I have been following her blog as well as her communications with a few other of my favorite bloggers. While watching her presentation I asked her the question,”How should I go about deciding which passion I am going to brand? I have narrowed it down to three passions and I am not sure which one would lead me down the strongest path”. She told me to evaluate what my final goal is as well as what my ideal self is. Those are two things that I really haven’t done, but will be working on as soon as I can. I am going to stay in contact with her and hopefully she continue to be a mentor for me.
2. Ever since freshman year of high school I have been following Merlin Mann’s blog 43folders in which he demonstrated ways to streamline or optimize your workflow. I ran into him in the bathroom and we sparked off after that. Over a 10 minute conversation with him I learned more about optimizing specific things than I could ever learned in an hour long presentation. As a matter of fact the conversation I had with him gave him the idea to setup a system for the type of optimization we were talking about. It was real impressive.
3. Finally, I would like to say that I met the CEO’s of the actual company that I was applying for. redPear, a local software development company in the valley is looking to train a college student such as myself to experience what it is actually like to be an entrepreneur. All three of the gentlemen were really nice. I hope the connection that I made at the conference will plant a good seed in the application process. :)
   If i do get the position I will work my heart out.

Once again, I want to thank you  for putting on such an influential event for me.
–name withheld pending permission

Arizona has a vibrant entrepreneurial community that has hardly noticed the recession, because most of its bright stars aren’t in real estate.  They are busy changing the world and growing their companies, bootstrapping, borrowing, begging — as entrepreneurs do in good times and bad. Each year, we like to showcase our own companies and bring in some out-of-towners to see what we’re doing.

This year, we will highlight four entrepreneurial growth segments you need to know about:
Digital Media Entrepreneurship, Health 2.0, Cloud Computing, and Sustainability.

Confirmed keynote speakers include:
-Tara Hunt, founder of Horse:Pig:Cow and author of “The Whuffie Factor”
-Michelle Robson, founder of EmpowHer.com, women’s health 2.0 site
-Kevin Surace, Founder and CEO of Serious Materials, green building technologies
-Howard Lindzon, co-founder, StockTwitS

Also, Pam Slim, author of “Escape from Cubicle Nation,” Merlin Mann, founder of 43Folders

and some wonderful workshops that will help you sell, raise money, take your business to the cloud, or participate in the next wave of digital media.

Where does the money from your ticket go? It goes to help entrepreneurs who are disadvantaged receive training and resources to continue the tradition of entrepreneurship. The Opportunity Through Entrepreneurship Foundation, a 501 (c)3, was founded in 2005 to help grow the community by growing our entrepreneurial culture. Every penny above our costs goes to fund programs.  There is no overhead and no administration in this organization. Visit the OTEF blog to see the results of our previous programs.

Passing the Torch

AZEC09 is the place where entrepreneurs gather to

Connect,  Share ideas, and Be Inspired.

We hope to see you there.

Even if you can’t make it, you still have the opportunity to participate by passing the entrepreneurial torch and sponsoring a student.  (Simply click REGISTER NOW up above) and select “Sponsor a Student”.

Each student is asked to complete a short essay after the event on their Three Best Take Aways from AZEC09 and share it with their sponsor.

Want to see what people are saying at #AZEC09? 

You can follow the tweet stream at http://twubs.com/AZEC09 or view the stream on the webpage – just click here.

For her work in this area, Fast Company magazine named Tara to its 2009 list of the Most Influential Women in Technology in 2009.

She is one of the most respected and cited thought leaders in community marketing—how to delight and enchant the people in the communities your company serves with products, experiences and communications that honor the expectations of online customer communities.

Community marketing is not about pushing messages or creating strong brands, but building relationships and engaging communities. Tara is an expert in using the tools and the opportunities of the participatory web to succeed, tools for building social capital—that is, whuffie.

Tara is the author of The Whuffie Factor: Using the Power of Social Networks to Build Your Business, a breakthrough book on community marketing. It provides the strategic map and specific tactics for success in the new economy and its elusive, lucrative world of online communities.

In the world of Web 2.0, market capital flows from social capital—from what Tara calls whuffie. This is the future of business and Tara Hunt has the knowledge and experience of someone who’s spent her career mastering how it works.

Tara was instrumental in making BarCamp, an international network of user-generated conferences, a worldwide phenomenon. She also is an active promoter of the Coworking movement, in which independent workers share workspace.

She speaks frequently at conferences around the world, including Mesh, the Future of Web Apps, ETech and Web 2.0 Expo. She blogs at horsepigcow.com.

Kevin Surace, CEO of Serious Materials, a noted speaker and writer on climate change and the built environment, is on a mission to significantly reduce the use of fossil fuels and their effect on the environment.  Kevin leads Serious Materials in its mission to reduce energy usage and CO2 generation of the world’s largest contributor, our buildings. By developing new materials and processes that require little energy to manufacture, and advanced products which dramatically improve the insulation and comfort of homes and offices, a worst-case climate and energy catastrophe can be avoided.

Before joining Serious Materials in 2002, Mr. Surace held executive and technical positions with Perfect Commerce, General Magic, Air Communications, National Semiconductor, and Seiko-Epson. He received his degree in electrical engineering technology from Rochester Institute of Technology where he currently serves on the Board of Trustees, and has been awarded multiple patents. Mr. Surace also serves on the boards of FreeLight, Array Converter, Zeta Communities, and Integrity Block; and chairs the Sunnyvale Mayoral Green Ribbon Committee.

Michelle King Robson is the Founder and Chairman of EmpowHer, which is a unique online resource dedicated to helping women improve their health and well-being. She started the company following her own personal struggle with a debilitating health issue that left her feeling hopeless and alone. In EmpowHer, Michelle has built a company that provides women with the most comprehensive and up-to-date information available on womens’ health, as well as a forum for women to connect and share stories of struggle and hope. Michelle is also an active philanthropist and community volunteer whose work on various women’s and children’s causes as well as the arts has earned her numerous awards and citations. Most recently, she was awarded the 2009 Health Communications Award by the National Osteoporosis Foundation. Michelle resides in Phoenix, Arizona with her husband Ed and daughter Amanda.

Since launching in December 2008 EmpowHer has grown to 500,000 unique women visitors per month and has been selected as one of Google News’ elite news sites that cover women’s health.