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High in the Cloud with Edroll: A Q&A with Startup Weekend Cebu 3's winners


The first weekend of June was quite a memorable one for the members of team "Edroll". The development group's cloud-based school enrollment system won Startup Weekend Cebu 3, held at the University of San Carlos-Downtown Campus in Cebu City and organized by the local grassroots community, Techtalks.ph, together with JCI Mandaue and DOST-ICTO.
 
Startup Weekend is a 54-hour event that gives the participants a venue to come together and share ideas, create business plans, build  prototypes, and learn whether an idea can be a viable business.
 
Remembering that weekend, I would say that it was very exhausting. I was involved both as a mentor and sponsor, handling the social media management for the event. We were always on our feet trying to cover each corner of the venue and livestreaming the event on two nights. It has been rainy most of the days, and the participants had to struggle with venue problems and team challenges as all of them vied for a spot in the top 3 winners of the prestigious Startup Weekend Cebu.
 
On the second day, I was assigned to a mentor roundtable together with a web development expert and a UI expert. Little did we know that we got actually mentored two of the winners of the event!
 
Finals night started out tense as every one worked almost overnight and everything that they could on their ideas. All presentations were set and tech checks were made. Livestreaming was set up. The judges started pouring in. The audience were ready. 
 
When the winners were announced, it became a celebration. Edroll, BloodMatch and AtYourServiceBai came out the victors after the 54-hour "boot camp" for entrepreneurs, developers, designers. The night ended with bottles of beer and glasses mojitos in an after party hosted by Synacy. Speaking of which, Synacy has created an great infographics that captures the statistics from Startup Weekend Cebu 3.
 
After the event, I communicated with the founder of Edroll, Mr. Ian Bert Tusil, to talk about his experience at Startup Weekend Cebu 3. Check out our interview:

 
What is Edroll?
 
Edroll is an enrollment system in the cloud. It aims to lessen if not eliminate the pains of enrollment.

 
How did you come up with the idea?
 
When I was enrolling my 3 year old daughter, we had to go back 2-3 times to get her enrollment done. I find it annoying and too tiring. I really believe that there must be a way to get her enrolled hassle-free.
 
We pivoted from a system that allows parents to see how their kids grow in school. From the feedbacks that we received, we realized that it would make sense if we start on solving enrollment issues first and deal with other issues later.

 
How does it feel winning Startup Weekend Cebu 3?
 
It feels great. The team are so happy and we're so proud that we all made it. I'm so lucky to have them and I think we are all happy that we have each other. I never expected this. With the technical difficulties that happened during the presentation, I never thought that we could pull it off, but, yeah we did. The mentors and coaches really gave us some tough stuff to think about, but all of them taught us a lot of things. We're happy and proud.

 
What were your challenges during the weekend and at the presentation?
 
It was the first time for me to talk and present in Startup Weekend in front of some of the big names in the business industry. It was very nerve-wracking. As I have mentioned, the mentors stirred us up and gave us different point of views, heavy ones. Another thing, each member of the team are contributing different ideas and even conflicting ones. I find it challenging to wrap them up together and make a decision. But thank God, they were all supporting. Last thing, it's a weekend. It was difficult for us to go out and get validation from universities. Good thing that one of the mentors (she knows who she is, thank you so much) taught us how to quickly get validation from the audience.
 

Who are the people in your team, their skills, and how did they contribute?
 
The team is composed of a Systems Engineer, Art Director, Senior Software Engineer, Business Manager and an Entrepreneur.

 
What are your plans in the next 3 months?
 
Within the next 3 months, we will continue to develop our product and establish relationships with potential partners and clients as well. Hopefully, in 3 months, we will be able to launch a Beta version of http://edroll.com to the public.
 
[Fleire Castro, a regular contributor to GMA News Online, is a professional blogger and co-founder of the Iligan Bloggers Society, Inc. is based in Cebu. She served as a mentor and sponsor at Startup Weekend Cebu 3.] — TJD, GMA News
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