Testimonials

Unreasonable Fellows range from a former child soldier from Liberia to McKinsey consultants and MIT graduates. They have secured US Navy contracts; partnerships with Wal-Mart, HP, and the Indian Government; landed $1.5 million in funding from the European Union, and recognition from the World Health Organization. One has generated over $1 million in revenue in 18 months selling waste. Another has provided capital to microentrepreneurs with 100% repayment rates also generating 34% in return. They include Ashoka Fellows, Echoing Green Fellows, and TED Fellows. They come from 17 countries. And below are thoughts from a few of them on what the Unreasonable Institute experience did for them.

“The difference between my venture before and after the Institute was night and day. We got more done in 6 weeks than we would have in a year.”

-2011 Fellow Nathaniel Koloc (United States), Founder of ReWork.

Notable Outcomes from Unreasonable: Nat and his team quadrupled their monthly revenue through improvements to business model from Unreasonable Mentors and locked up one significant client that enabled them to scale to a second US city. They also brought on Unreasonable Mentor Bruce Campbell as legal representation and Unreasonable Mentor Jane Miller as a board member.

“The Unreasonable Institute exceeded every expectation I had by a factor of 10. Mentorship and funding opportunities? Beyond what you could imagine. Huge insights and life-long friendships? Absolutely. It’s not venture-changing, it’s life-changing.” ”

-2010 Fellow Emily Kerr (United States), Founder of Liga Masiva.

Notable Outcomes from Unreasonable: Emily raised $125,000 from Unreasonable Mentors. She also secured the co-founder of America’s second largest natural foods stores, Libby Cook, as a board member and brought on a new teammate.

“The Unreasonable Institute was a life-changing experience. It provided a number of direct benefits to my business through contacts with investors and partnerships with other Fellows and large corporations such as HP and Google through mentors.”

-2011 Fellow Ties Kroezen (Netherlands), founder of NICE International.

Notable Outcomes from Unreasonable: Ties secured a partnership with Hewlett-Packard (HP). He has also begun sales and distribution for a number of other Fellows and Mentors in the Gambia. Unrelated to his time at Unreasonable, he also just closed a $1.5 million round of funding from the European Union.

Funding

The 2010 Unreasonable Institute accelerated 22 ventures. During the Institute, 15 of those were actively seeking funding. Within 3 months of the completion of the Institute, 10 (67%) secured between $30,000 and $400,000 in capital, with 7 receiving funding directly from Unreasonable Mentors.

We’re waiting on results from the 2011 Institute still, but as soon as we have them, we’ll update funding outcomes!

Strength of Community

We pride ourselves on the kind of community that has our Fellows’ backs. The community is what provides the most ongoing support to each other, whether it be building partnerships to test and sell products in a new market, connecting Fellows to even more resources to build and scale their venture, finding capital and new world class teammates, and more.

Here is a sampling of the support happening amongst the Unreasonable community:

• 2011 Fellows Ties Kroezen and Moses Sanga are piloting the sale of 2011 Fellow Gaurav Machanda’s solar lanterns in Gambia and Uganda. Additionally, Ties will pilot selling Envirofit cook stoves after a connection with Mentor Paul Hudnut.
• 2010 Fellow Rafael Smith has joined the team of Solar Mosaic, a company founded at the Institute by 2010 Fellow Daniel Rosen and 2011 Mentor Billy Parish.
• 16 Fellows got either scholarships to attend, spoke at and/or were profiled at SoCap 2011, the largest investor gathering in the space, thanks to Unreasonable mentors Kevin Jones and Rosa Lee Harden and Unreasonable capital partner Halloran Philanthropies. This included 2011 Fellow Tiago Dalvi whose products were given to everyone at SoCap (his first sales in the US) and 2011 Fellow Saba Gul garnered tons of interest in her products from people after she spoke on the opening panel along with Mentor Kevin Starr.
• Mentor Jane Miller has joined the board of 2011 Fellow Nat Koloc’s venture TerraShift.
• Additionally, 4 Fellows and 2 Staff have gotten tattoos of the Unreasonable logo. We’re not kidding. Here’s a picture of one such tattoo.


Alumni satisfaction (from September, 2011 survey):
We asked both our 2010 and 2011 Fellows to rank their satisfaction with the Institute.

• When asked to “Rate their overall satisfaction with being an Unreasonable Fellow on a scale of 1-5″ (1 being lowest, 5 being highest) the average was a 4.54 out of 5.
• When asked “How strongly you would recommend Unreasonable Institute to a friend?” (1 being lowest, 5 being highest) the average was again a 4.54 out of 5.