Last week I gave a speech at la USACH (Universidad de Santiago de Chile), and the university newspaper covered it!

Click the image twice to see it at full size (all in Spanish.)

Here are the slides from my speech.  They’re in Spanish, but I think the pictures make them fairly self-explanatory.  I spoke about Silicon Valley, how the spirit of Silicon Valley has shaped me and my family, my experiences in China and Chile, Start-Up Chile, and Go To Market.

Leslie Forman’s speech at USACH July 25, 2011

Special thanks to my dad for the photo on slide #3. I must have been 4 or 5 years old, and absolutely delighted to be using our Apple 2!

The overall goal of my speech was to encourage Chilean researchers to apply to Go To Market, a program sponsored by CORFO (Chile’s economic development agency) and SRI (the non-profit technology research institution formerly known as Stanford Research Institute).  Go To Market is an opportunity for Chilean researchers to apply to win a 6-week fellowship to visit SRI in Menlo Park, California, and work with world-renowned experts to commercialize their technologies.  Everyone who applies will get feedback on their invention and ideas about how to commercialize it. At USACH I met researchers who held patents for technologies to ensure the quality of meat and increase the output of rice.

The professor who invited me asked me to emphasize that Silicon Valley is a place that approaches failure as a necessary part of the innovation process.  In Chile, most people are terrified of failure. It is not seen well in this society. People build close, life-long, family-focused networks, and these are the base of most professional opportunities. Also I have heard that bankruptcy laws here serve as a big deterrent against taking risks in business.  But this is changing, and several Chilean friends have told me that Start-Up Chile hs helped to catalyze a gradual change in this part of the culture.

This was my first time giving a speech in Spanish, and my first time serving as a representative of Silicon Valley.  The 20 or so professors, researchers, and students at the table asked some excellent questions about innovation, China, and more. I look forward to my next opportunity to share my stories (and, ahem, childhood photos) with this type of group.