Giving tomorrow's business leaders a head start!

Learn from Professional Mentors

Develop your own Startup Idea

Code your Mobile App Prototype

Pitch to an Esteemed Panel of Judges

Look out for SEE Incubator Programs Summer 2022

Overview

The Nebula Entrepreneurship eXperience (NEX) is a 4-week online summer camp for high schoolers. With a team of fellow co-founders, you’ll learn how to develop your own tech startup! Grasp essential entrepreneurial concepts from industry-leading mentors in Google, Uber, Amazon, etc. while coding a mobile app prototype of your product. The final pitch day allows teams to present their work to a panel of accomplished judges and parents. NEX is entirely online for 2021!

What you'll learn

Crucial Entrepreneurial Skills

Idea Generation
Finance
Marketing
Investor Pitching

Interacting professionally with peers
Tackling real-world problems with innovative solutions!
Developing an intuitive and beautiful mobile application
Dive into the entrepreneurial world & learn from case studies

What you'll experience

A passionate team of organizers ready to help whenever needed
A group of professional mentors with several years of experience & high-caliber judges (several CEOs)
Opportunities for expanding your love for entrepreneurship as an Alumni – you can even become a volunteer and lead your own camp!
Qualified tech mentors to teach you app development

Program Structure

Week 1

Get exposed to foundational entrepreneurship concepts!

Week 2

Week 3

Hard Skills (Curriculum)

Idea Generation

What is the process of coming up with industry-disrupting ideas? How do you identify certain problems and develop feasible solutions? You'll learn the creative process behind developing a startup.

Marketing

Convincing people to buy your product is hard. You'll learn how to competitively price and develop marketing strategies for social media in order to sell effectively.

Finance

Only designing features won't get you far! Learn key concepts on how to raise seed money for your startup and how to manage your monetary resources for maximum efficiency.

Product Management & Design

Product management is key to making sure that the design and implementation of your app is as efficient as possible. Learn how the different mechanisms of a company work to solve problems effectively.

Investor Pitching

It's not only about what you build - it's also about how you present it to others, especially your investors. Along with peer mentors, you'll be mastering your startup's presentation for actual investors to look at.

Coding

Throughout the Startup Incubator, you'll be learning how to develop an app. This will enable you to prototype your idea with a proper tech stack!! It's always great to put words in code and show off your startup.

Life-Long Skills

Networking

As you work with your mentors on developing your startup, you'll have a chance to network with them and inquire further about their industry. You'll also get a chance to collaborate and build a startup with like-minded peers!

Critical Thinking

It's not easy to rationally think about a real-world problem and design a unique solution for it. As you rack your brains for innovation bursts, you'll learn how to critically think about specific issues that affect people. You'll also start thinking about the idea of feasibility and transforming creativity into a proper business idea.

Resourcefulness

As students, you don't have tons of financial backing or resources. This camp will teach you to be inherently resourceful with what you have and still deliver a fantastic product. From mobile apps to simple mechanic gadgets, the power of simplicity and prototyping will eventually shine in your work.

Pitch Day!

The most exciting day for a Shooting Stars student is always Pitch Day! Over the four weeks of learning, you and your team would have been simultaneously learning about entrepreneurial concepts and applying them as you build your business. After several 1-on-1s and refinement, Pitch Day is when you can finally present your hard work! You’ll present both the business and the tech aspect of your product. The audience consists of your past mentors, highly skilled judges (most of them being CEO / CFO / CTO, etc.), and your parents. You’ll get a chance to profesionally pitch your company with thoughtful comments from the audience! You will also see what your peers have accomplished with their time at SEE

Eligibility

8th Grade – 12th Grade
3.0 GPA or Higher (The application asks for an unofficial transcript if you can obtain it)
Coding experience not needed but preferred
Passionate about entrepreneurship and technology
Must have laptop w/ Windows or macOS
Able to Commit 10+ Hours per Week
Need financial aid?
Email info@shooting-stars-foundation.org

Logistics

Sessions: Posted below!
Grades: 8 -12
Cost: $499 ($449 Early Bird until May 15th)
Times: 4 weeks, Wed – Sun from 4-6 PM PST
Slots: Limited
Pre-requisites: Laptop (No ChromeOS!) & Preferred basic coding skills

Session Dates

Coding Pre-Requisite

SEE does not require extensive knowledge of programming, since we use code to design mobile apps rather than build complex architectures.

If you know how to use variables, if-statements, loops, and arraylists, you have met the coding pre-req.

If not, don’t worry! We suggest you catch up by watching the 2-hr dart programming course that introduces you to coding, which is enough to fulfill the pre-requisite.

Once you apply, the SEE team will contact you about your application status and further steps within 2 business days.

Past Mentors & Judges at Nebula

Anil Singhal

Chief Executive Officer

Kevin Lee

Lecturer & Instructor

Arun Valliappan

Strategy & Ops Manager

Mani Sundaram

Director

Parent Reviews

My son recently participated in the Nebula Online Startup Incubator with a small group of friends. We were so impressed by the organization of the camp and the breadth of topics and exposure that occurred in just 4 short weeks. With the excellent guidance of the professional and peer mentors, they were able to develop a solid business plan and working prototype which can be further developed into an actual start-up company. The format of this camp is perfect for any motivated high school student who is interested in technology and entrepreneurship. We highly recommend Nebula Youth Camps! – Kathy Kobayashi, Pleasanton, CA (June Cohort Parent)

“My son enjoyed the startup incubator program as it gave him the quickest overview of how to turn an idea into a real product which can be of value and a differentiator to existing competition as well as provide revenue to the company. The quality of the program was very high and what made it even more worthwhile is that it is run by a non-profit organization that helps to support the education of underprivileged college students. I recommend this program to all high school students who have an interest in the field of STEM!”- Sangeetha (April Cohort Parent)

"I was so impressed by the depth of the program and the quality of the mentorship. Everyone involved had such positivity and gave great constructive insight. The program was an excellent blend of technical programming and business understanding"

Participant Reviews

To be honest, I never imagined myself as an entrepreneur and was a little intimidated in the beginning with the whole concept of the NEX program. Meeting up and working together with people I have never met before and creating a business in four weeks sounded pretty bizarre…

Vibhu Krishnan

A Past Alum of the Nebula Online Incubator

Attending the first NEX Incubator run by Nebula entrepreneurship camps was one of the best learning experiences I have had. I was thrown head first into a world of technology and entrepreneurship, and very early on I was exposed to many high level concepts…

Saketh Kamuju

A Past Alum of the Nebula Online Incubator

Before the start of the NEX, the thought of starting my own business eluded me. I could never imagine doing the work to create a product, pitch it, find investors, and even learn about the business aspects of starting a company…

Vikram Nagapudi

A Past Alum of the Nebula Online Incubator

NEX was undoubtedly a great experience for me. Never did I imagine that our team would be able to create a working prototype and business plan for our product, QuestSuggest, in just four weeks…

Arnav Mankand

A Past Alum of the Nebula Online Incubator

FAQs

What is the goal of SEE?

The goal is to foster the entrepreneurial mindset in the participants, and to introduce them to many basic concepts and ideas which are frequently used in starting a company.

What type of instruction are the participants offered?

The participants work with industry-leading mentors who have plenty of experience starting and building businesses. The participants will have a lecture session with the mentors which explain concepts in Idea Generation, Product Management, Marketing, Finance, and Pitching. Once they work with their team, they will have a 1-on-1 session with the mentors to work on specific parts of their business. Once the camp is finished, mentors will share contact information so participants will be able to reach out with any of their questions.

What is the primary source of communication in this camp?

We use WhatsApp—during the camp and with our organizing team. Please let us know if you do not have a WhatsApp or are unable to use it for any reason.

Is homework assigned in NEX?

Yes, we ask participants to regularly complete homework after each session. This work should be done by teams together, and should be taken seriously. NEX is modeled similar to a group of people creating a startup, and the homework reflects tasks that many companies perform during their first few months.

How much coding is involved in the camp?

While we don’t have a specific coding prerequisite that our participants must have completed, we do suggest participants have basic knowledge of key concepts—conditional statements, for-loops, and variables. If you do not know how to code, do not worry! Please watch the video below, which will cover your coding pre-requisite.

Participants will work with coding mentors and professionals to build their app on Flutter.

Who can I contact with my questions?

Please feel free to reach out to us with any questions as info@sstarsfoundation.org. Moreover, the above buttons allow you to actually contact past alumni students / parents! They can clear up any doubts about SEE.

SEE will also have information sessions that you can sign up for by entering your email in the field above.