Jessica Mah’s $500 to Startup
Jessica Mah, 18-year old entrepreneur, launches her startup, internshipIN, today. Her total cost was about $500 and roughly two weeks of development time. She started the website with two other friends (Arielle Patrice Scott and Andy Su) at UC Berkeley, with her story here:
internshipIN began at Gypsies, the local Italian restaurant in downtown Berkeley, where Arielle and Jessica discussed how they planned to change the world. They knew it had to do with helping other students and startups, they just didn’t know how. They were only a couple of bites into their pasta when the laptops were busted open and they were discussing implementation and design – internshipIN was born.
But Jess knew she was going to need Andy on board to make it happen. Arielle’s stomach went crazy waiting to find out if Andy would agree to join the team or not. She didn’t wait too long, however, because a couple of hours later, Jess and Andy were already working on a prototype. (what a great way to procrastinate math homework!) With only five nights of coding, the two of them were able to launch the first beta.
InternshipIN is a job board, specifically focused on the internship matches between employers and students. InternshipIN allows employers to make job posts, while also crawling other job boards, such as SimplyHired, for internship-specific listings. The website’s goal is help smaller companies find good talent for a fraction of the price.
Moreover, getting that first summer internship is pretty hard. When I was looking for internships a few summers ago, I remember how nerve-wrecking it was. I had basically no work experience, and there were not any specific tools to help me out. This website aims to fill that niche. Another website that students may find helpful is InternshipRatings.
Overall, internshipIN is a good example about just getting your product out there. Their website is very minimal, but it works. The next step for them would be to get user feedback and continue to iterate on top of that. I wish them the best of luck.
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November 4, 2008 at 10:33 pm
[...] if I make it into Berkeley, I could start companies with the likes of Jessica Mah. Best of luck ...