Memorandum

September 10, 2016

To: Alan Fine
From: Jonathan Smith
RE: Entrepreneurial Research Project Assignment File

Short Introduction here, quick what is it about and is structured into six sections:
1. Background of the Entrepreneur
2. The Business
3. The Venture’s Beginning
4. Key Challenges
5. Learning Experiences during the Venture
6. What I Learned from the Interview

Background of the Entrepreneur

The interview was conducted with Chris Sawotin the CEO and co-founder of CureIS which is
headquartered in Woodbury, Minnesota. Chris, a native of Canada, first displayed
entrepreneurial instincts when he took a break from college in order to pay tuition costs. As a
result, Chris became self-employed, by setting up NETBEUI networks for local businesses.

No one in Chris’ family was an entrepreneur. When I questioned further as to what factors of his
early life or upbringing contributed to becoming a successful entrepreneur, he provided an
unexpected answer. Everyone is an entrepreneur inside, but not everyone is willing to take
action. Before launching CureIS, Chris was the VP of Sales and Solutions of SafeNet consulting,
where he was able to build key relationships.

The Business
CureIS provides automated solutions focused on relieving the administrative and accuracy pain
points in hospital’s data-entry based systems. The product provides a unified database of patient
enrollment records with all discrepancies and erroneous information corrected for all of the
healthcare provider’s patient records across its multiple locations. This describes the core
flagship product of CureIS, and the exact market opportunity that launched the venture.

At first, it might seem like what CureIS offers isn’t anything new. Rules engines, automating
repetitive tasks, and normalizing data has been around for over a decade in other industries.
What CureIS offers are one-stop products that seamlessly integrate into a hospital’s current
infrastructure at less than a quarter of the cost if the hospital was to develop an in-house solution.

The Venture’s Beginning

The venture began somewhat unexpectedly and in a non-conventional manner. No startup-capital
or loans were used to initiate the business, yet all employee wages were paid. In addition, Chris
had the first major contract signed shortly after the venture began.

CureIS began in the midst of uncertainty and a period of transition for Chris. He had recently
resigned his position and was looking for new opportunities. During this time, a group of Chris’
previous independent contractors contacted him about heading up a new venture. He was
reluctant to be involved due the risks it would place on his family. After speaking with his wife
and speaking with the team, he agreed to help them along, a decision that later resulted in a full
commitment to the venture.

The next step was to use a key contact Chris had at a hospital. Through this relationship, CureIS
landed its first contract which paid wages, provided an upfront sum for initial costs, and
promised a larger sum on completion of the contract. The project was later dropped due to
management changes but it permitted the venture to get its start. After three years of business,
CureIS was able to net a positive return by fulfilling two client-hospital contract in California.

Key Challenges
The following provides the main challenges Chris identified as being the most important:
 No startup capital and sweat equity
 Not being paid after development milestones
 Experiencing a drastic change in income over a three-year period

No startup capital and sweat equity

Chris and the starting team decided early on not to give up any equity in the company or
borrow large sums of money to finance the company’s projects. Chris was able to overcome
this obstacle by approaching customers to pay wages for development and provide an upfront
sum at the beginning of the contract.

Not being paid after development milestones

In the first two years of the business, the company struggled to have its original client
hospital accept their product’s quality for the purposes of contract fulfillment on a number of
occasions. Chris was able to overcome this obstacle by maintaining a strong respectful
relationship with his key contact in the hospital who led him to his next clients in California.

Experiencing a drastic change in income over a three-year period

Starting the business with no income guarantee except the future payment in equity value
was a serious challenge for a husband and father of three children. Chris was able to
overcome this challenge by his wife’s income and finding ways to cut overall household
spending. Most importantly he had the full support of his wife.

Learning Experiences during the Venture

During the business’ venture, Chris had a number of learning experiences:
 Always ask the customer what can be improved
 Don’t let the customer see the sausage being made
 Projects always take longer than your best estimates

Always ask the customer what can be improved

Due to his experiences with the original client hospital, Chris would ask his clients after a
project was completed what grade they would give CureIS for the quality of their work. If
they said an A, he would ask what he would need to do to get an A+. In exchange, he asked
 the hospital to tell a hospital director about CureIS. This lead driving and marketing tactic
has been a key to CureIS’s success.

Don’t let the customer see the sausage being made

Early on during the venture the customer was aware of too many project issues during the
development cycle. In hindsight, the amount of disclosure should have been managed more
discretely so that the customer doesn’t become overly critical.

Projects always take longer than your best estimates

For large scale projects that require a high level of coordination amongst multiple entities
that internal and external to the company, unexpected delays should be expected. Engineers
and customers in general need some kind of tangible product to interact with before a
meaningful discussion of what a product should be can fully arise.

What I Learned from the Interview

I gained many new insights from the interview with Chris due to his unconventional approach to
business venturing. He is not only an innovator in the products he sells but in the operational
tactics of his business. The following are my key takeaways from the exchange:
 Don’t limit yourself to conventional startup capital wisdom
 Customers should be an integral part of your marketing strategy
 Think creatively to solve problems and form processes
 Resilience is key

Don’t limit yourself to conventional startup capital wisdom

Chris was able to start a business with zero startup capital and have the wages for his veteran
team paid all by his first customer. While this might be unique to a B2B strategy, it shows
that every opportunity needs to be considered. The traditional raise capital and borrow
against equity can be augmented to reduce risk or leave more equity to the founding team.

Customers should be an integral part of your marketing strategy

When starting a new business, if the customer isn’t satisfied, you’ll be closing your doors
soon. Furthermore, the best way to market your product is to have enthusiastic customers
generate leads for you. Prospective customers will have greater trust during the sales process
because someone they respect told them about you.

Think creatively to solve problems and form processes

It is difficult to count the number of times I was amazed by the way Chris decided to handle
an obstacle. Whether it was with how he managed not being paid for project milestones by
his customers, having his first customer drop the project, his A+ tactic, or finding various
areas to keep his operational costs exceptionally low, Chris consistently found way others
wouldn’t to address the needs of his business in unique ways.

Resilience is key
There were many times the business should have ended but Chris continued anyway because
failure wasn’t an option. This resilience I believe is key to his creativity. By being forced into
a corner a deciding to continue anyway, he is able to spontaneously discover new solutions.