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[MUSIC PLAYING]
I'm Rick Turoczy.
I'm the general manager of PIE, the Portland Incubator
Experiment.
PIE is a startup accelerator that helps early-stage tech
startups with things like funding, mentorship, finding
staff, and basically having an office space
out of which to work.
We're a collaborative office space where all the startups
sit together, six to eight that are going through the
program, and help one another, as well as work with the
mentor network to grow their businesses.
Our job is really to make the startups uncomfortable and
push them further, faster than they would be pushed in the
outside world.
Part of that experience is working with global
advertising agency Wieden+Kennedy, who helps
support the PIE space.
Wieden+Kennedy works with clients like Facebook,
Coca-Cola, and others.
But they also help these early stage startups with things
like branding, or their logos, or their positioning, and in
so doing, really sets those startups apart in a space
that's highly competitive and has a lot of [INAUDIBLE].
We work on our program for three months at a time, where
we invite six to eight startups to come in
and work with us.
After the program, they're invited to stay in the space
for the remaining nine months until we
bring in the next class.
[MUSIC PLAYING]