Entrepreneurship was the focus of NU Edge, an annual program designed to connect students in Niagara University’s Holzschuh College of Business Administration with leaders in the local business ecosystem and help them discover the pathways available for their career success. This year’s event took place on Nov. 18 in the Russell Salvatore Dining Commons on the Niagara University campus.
Guest speakers Sarah Tanbakuchi-Ripa, CEO and president of the 43North Foundation, and Gina Thompson, vice president of sales for HeronAI, one of the $1 million winners of the 2024 43North startup competition, discussed their entrepreneurial journeys, how tech-entrepreneurship is supporting the economic revitalization of Western New York, and the various opportunities for new entrepreneurs to start their dreams in the Buffalo region.
Tanbakuchi-Ripa began her career in law before joining an executive training program with M&T Bank, where she took on a leadership role as chief of staff for the bank’s chief information officer and assisted in launching Tech Academy, a community asset designed to train technologists both at M&T and within the community. She was then offered the opportunity to serve as president and CEO of TechBuffalo, a nonprofit organization building a sustainable, inclusive, and accessible tech ecosystem. Three years later, she accepted her current position with the 43North Foundation, an independent and separate entity from the 43North competition that plays a pivotal role in transforming the local economy by supporting startups and attracting talent.
“I share my career journey with you to hopefully provide the example of the fact that I didn’t know what I wanted to do,” she said. “But over the course of my career, I was able to stitch together this skill set that somehow made me just the right person for this particular role. So hopefully that provides a little bit of comfort that you don’t need to know what you’re going to do when you graduate, but you do just need to take the first step to that first role. And that’s why they call it a journey, essentially, because you have no idea where your career’s going to take you.”
Tanbakuchi-Ripa also explained the mission of the 43North Foundation and ways the students could connect with it to follow their own entrepreneurial dreams.
Thompson then joined Tanbakuchi-Ripa on stage for a discussion about her own entrepreneurial journey, which included starting up a cloud division within Ingram Micro and running Microsoft’s worldwide sales operations and business processes for business applications before launching Pax Cabinetry and eventually joining HeronAI.
She offered advice to students who were interested in starting their own businesses and her perspective of the role failure plays in that journey.
“There’s a possibility that you will fail, but I look at failure as a way to grow,” she said. “If you don’t fail and learn from it, you’ll never keep advancing. So I don’t look at failure as a negative thing, I look at failure as a positive thing.”
Both women noted that, although AI is changing the way people do business, it won’t take the place of the “human component,” which will be critical in ensuring that AI is being used as a tool for good.
“How do you sit beside that technology as a copilot and make sure it does have the greatest impact and it does create more accessibility and more democratic access,” said Tanbakuchi-Ripa.
“We’re not looking to displace people,” Thompson added. “It’s more displacing the busy work and the analytics and collecting the data. But it’s really going to be people that are working with what that data is to better your business (and) better society.”
Freshman Michael Calabret, a finance major from Cleveland, Ohio, was especially interested in the AI discussion and found this event an opportunity to explore different possibilities.
“I’m definitely not tech savvy,” he said, “but I know that it’s only going to be an increasing part of our society.” He added that the event “opened my eyes to see where AI can go, and that you don’t have to have a tech background to start a business with AI. Niagara’s outstanding at setting up their students for success by giving us the opportunity to connect with these business owners.”
“The NU Edge event was incredibly inspiring,” said Juan Cardona, a graduate student studying finance. “Hearing from Sarah Tanbakuchi-Ripa and Gina Thompson offered a powerful reminder that you don’t always know exactly what the future holds, but you still need to take that first step and leave fear behind. As a graduate student preparing to enter the professional world, their stories about embracing uncertainty, taking risks, and creating opportunities truly resonated with me. Their perspectives reinforced the importance of staying open, confident, and committed to growth as we navigate the start of our careers.”
