Interview with C Major, the April FEC Winning Team
We caught up with three of the four members of C Major, the winning team in our April FEC cohort. C Major is building an app that transcribes audio recordings into sheet music, plays it through synthesized instruments, and lets you create music collaboratively with friends. We asked them about what they learned and what advice they have for students who are about to start the program.
How has your perspective on entrepreneurship or business changed since the course began?
V: In the beginning I thought that entrepreneurship was just thinking about a good business idea, but in reality there’s a lot more to it, like what type of customers you need to look for. And it’s very specific. I didn’t know it was that specific.
H: I’d say pretty similar, but more about writing work. I thought it was more about numbers, but there’s a lot of writing and your own perspective that you need to put into it.
J: I guess my perspective on what makes a good business has changed. I used to think it was mainly price, customer acquisition, retention…now I know it’s almost, if not all, about value — value to the customers, to the investors. What they get out of the company. I realized there’s so much more and there’s always ways to add more value.
What was the most important thing you got from this class?
H: I would say that realizing how important customers and relationships between people are in the whole entrepreneurship program. It’s not just yourself. You can’t really go by yourself without talking with people to start an actual business. There’s a lot of processes in entrepreneurship where you need to communicate and have a good relationship between people and your whole society and community.
V: I learned how much teamwork we needed in order to come up with an idea in such a short amount of time. We didn’t know each other in the beginning, so we had to learn a lot of communication skills and work together to think of a company.
J: Definitely just experience. Pitching in front of real investors, knowing what it’s really like. I got a sense of that stress. It’s gonna be like that and worse in the future. It’s good to get ready.
If you were talking to someone just starting this program, what would you tell them?
V: I would tell them to not be afraid to ask questions. This class is relatively fast-paced so they might miss a lot of stuff or get lost. I think it’s really good if they ask a lot of questions.
J: Two things. One, don’t be afraid to reach out for help, because the help is very useful. Two, get ready, cuz it’s fast-paced.
H: Know that you’re contributing time into this and you have to contribute time to this. You have to spend some time thinking about it, working on it with your team. Know that you’re contributing time.
I was definitely expecting work after class but I want people to know that you have to work with your team, you’re not working by yourself.
J: I felt like our team met outside of class a lot more than I expected to. But that’s a good thing.
