Catch Up With Chuck | Episode 24

Rural Futures Institute Author

04/26/2018 Added

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Bill Udell

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[00:00:13.991]Welcome to the Rural Futures Institute
[00:00:16.068]at the University of Nebraska.
[00:00:18.165]I'm Chuck Schroeder, I'm executive director of the institute
[00:00:20.656]and this is Catch Up With Chuck.
[00:00:23.609]You're in for a treat today.
[00:00:24.891]I'm gonna introduce you to
[00:00:27.104]a really interesting fellow that is a myth buster.
[00:00:32.514]Bill Udell is a rural Nebraska kid
[00:00:36.257]who is absolutely shattering the myth
[00:00:38.486]that young people from Nebraska
[00:00:40.616]have to go to the Research Triangle in North Carolina,
[00:00:44.211]or Silicon Valley in California
[00:00:46.680]to be a part of the tech revolution.
[00:00:50.270]Bill, welcome.
[00:00:51.813]I appreciate you inviting me.
[00:00:52.919]I appreciate you calling me a kid.
[00:00:54.348](Chuck laughs)
[00:00:56.548]I'm not sure that my children would agree.
[00:00:58.237]Well, we're all kids here. Okay.
[00:01:01.045]You're one of the freshest thinkers that I know.
[00:01:03.317]So listen then, I wanna set the stage right from the start.
[00:01:06.501]You've been a key player in building a successful,
[00:01:10.478]very interesting enterprise here in Lincoln
[00:01:13.232]called Don't Panic Labs, where you have been part of
[00:01:17.341]software development, corporate innovation, but also
[00:01:20.875]colliding tech innovation with business principles
[00:01:25.384]and launching a number of now successful
[00:01:28.737]tech-based companies that are all about problem-solving.
[00:01:31.748]So Don't Panic Labs has really emerged
[00:01:34.771]as a great Nebraska success story,
[00:01:38.235]and I wanna hear your side of how this all happened,
[00:01:42.842]because it's a pretty fun story.
[00:01:44.342]Yeah, well, you know, it kind of starts
[00:01:46.606]about eight years ago.
[00:01:49.108]Nebraska ranked 52nd out of 50 states,
[00:01:52.121]which is hard to believe that it was actually behind
[00:01:53.878]Puerto Rico and D.C. in venture capital.
[00:01:57.736]There just wasn't any money out there
[00:01:59.268]to create new software-based start-up companies.
[00:02:02.786]And there also weren't any software engineers
[00:02:04.571]that really had expertise at taking things from
[00:02:08.730]kind of vision to version one.
[00:02:12.401]So we kinda set out to solve that problem.
[00:02:14.047]We raised a fund, a $30 million venture capital fund
[00:02:17.381]called Nebraska Global, and then
[00:02:19.713]started training software developers to
[00:02:24.153]take things that are an idea
[00:02:26.154]and move them into software.
[00:02:28.707]And we had some real great success with that,
[00:02:31.642]and we're really proud of the companies we've created.
[00:02:33.388]Companies like, you know,
[00:02:34.726]things that aren't household names but we're proud of.
[00:02:36.829]Beehive, they do asset management, municipalities.
[00:02:42.879]And Elite Form, they use three-dimensional
[00:02:45.762]depth-sensing cameras to track weight-lifting bars
[00:02:48.418]in three-dimensional space,
[00:02:50.057]which sounds like a lot of big words and jargon,
[00:02:52.007]but what it really does is it allows trainers
[00:02:55.420]in weight rooms like the University of Nebraska
[00:02:57.409]to track the performance of their athletes.
[00:03:00.592]So they can actually watch the bar
[00:03:02.168]and see just how much velocity
[00:03:04.317]an athlete is using when they're lifting the bar.
[00:03:06.038]And that technology is now in most Division 1 universities
[00:03:08.574]and professional football and soccer and rugby.
[00:03:12.561]US Navy Seals use it, so it's now a product
[00:03:15.677]and a company that is infiltrated internationally.
[00:03:18.787]So we're proud of the things we've created there.
[00:03:21.014]Well, you've covered such a broad array of problems
[00:03:25.716]that you and your team have been willing
[00:03:28.061]to jump in and try to solve.
[00:03:29.864]Well, listen, one of the reasons
[00:03:31.217]that we wanted to have Bill Udell
[00:03:33.295]on Catch Up With Chuck is because
[00:03:36.034]you're a rural success story yourself.
[00:03:38.323]Oh, geez. Now Burwell, Nebraska
[00:03:40.533]is rural by anyone's standards, I'd have to say.
[00:03:44.512]So listen, it's always interesting to our audience
[00:03:47.108]to kinda know where people come from.
[00:03:49.783]Their upbringing, what caused them
[00:03:53.278]to have the kind of vision and energy that they're investing
[00:03:57.854]in creating a better future.
[00:03:59.379]So I want you to tell the Bill Udell story.
[00:04:02.394]Well, that's a long story.
[00:04:03.523]It all started-- no. (both laugh)
[00:04:05.743]So you're right, I was born in Burwell, Nebraska,
[00:04:08.859]but, you know, my story and who I am
[00:04:10.287]kinda starts a couple generations ago.
[00:04:13.120]My grandfather was an entrepreneur.
[00:04:16.141]He actually started a business in Holdrege first
[00:04:18.677]before starting Udell Feed & Supply in Burwell.
[00:04:22.972]My dad was then also an entrepreneur
[00:04:24.803]and small business owner.
[00:04:26.266]He kept running my grandpa's feed store,
[00:04:29.611]Udell Feed & Supply, you know,
[00:04:32.245]and that really shaped my world view,
[00:04:36.613]having them be entrepreneurs.
[00:04:38.676]And then my dad took it a step further
[00:04:40.680]and became incredibly active
[00:04:44.922]in community-building around Burwell.
[00:04:48.290]To his last day, he was one of the biggest advocates
[00:04:52.542]for the city of Burwell.
[00:04:54.181]Anybody that would ask him would hear
[00:04:55.744]a glowing story about why they should uproot
[00:04:58.761]and move to Burwell, vacation in Burwell, live in Burwell.
[00:05:02.884]It's the key to every thriving rural community we know.
[00:05:05.756]Yeah, so, you know, kinda having that as my root,
[00:05:08.714]that civic pride, that's never really left me.
[00:05:12.730]So I've kinda carried that with me,
[00:05:13.987]I've carried it into Lincoln, everything that I've done with
[00:05:16.223]Nebraska Global, Don't Panic Labs
[00:05:17.575]has also had a sense of civic pride, Nebraska pride.
[00:05:21.294]You know, that's fed into the desire to have
[00:05:23.176]Nebraska Global be more than just building companies.
[00:05:25.598]It's about building Nebraska.
[00:05:28.120]We wanna make us competitive on a national stage.
[00:05:32.306]And I think that comes from
[00:05:35.740]my grandparents, my parents, and now it's in me.
[00:05:39.156]It is, it's the legacy. Yep.
[00:05:40.760]It's the legacy. Well, listen,
[00:05:42.568]when you and I met, you'd heard something
[00:05:45.170]about the mission of the Rural Futures Institute.
[00:05:47.253]I had heard a bit about the success of Don't Panic Labs.
[00:05:50.650]Our mutual friend, Rich Claussen, with Prosper Lincoln,
[00:05:53.623]who's one of the great connectors, I think,
[00:05:56.493]in our culture, said you guys oughta get together.
[00:05:59.549]And I'm so grateful that he did.
[00:06:02.244]But listen, I wanna get to the heart of your vision
[00:06:05.638]for taking the success that you've had
[00:06:08.814]with Don't Panic Labs and Nebraska Global.
[00:06:13.042]The first conversation you and I had was about your vision
[00:06:16.235]for taking that success model
[00:06:17.798]and taking it to rural communities.
[00:06:21.384]Not shoving them behind as though they don't matter
[00:06:23.809]but this mission that you've just described.
[00:06:26.760]I want you to talk a little bit more about that vision,
[00:06:29.201]Bill, and what you think could happen.
[00:06:31.685]Yeah, you know, it's a complex vision,
[00:06:34.506]but it's something that we think
[00:06:36.629]we can see some success that we've had in Lincoln
[00:06:39.869]repeated in Greater Nebraska.
[00:06:43.649]You know, there are a lot of folks
[00:06:45.054]who have really great intentions
[00:06:46.194]and they wanna come back into rural communities
[00:06:47.770]and try to help.
[00:06:49.670]What we think we've figured out, though,
[00:06:51.203]is a mechanism where we can find,
[00:06:55.449]you know, those handful of entrepreneurs.
[00:06:57.124]And by the way, those entrepreneurs are not
[00:06:59.869]the typical entrepreneurs you might think of.
[00:07:01.278]We look at people that are raising cattle, farmers,
[00:07:05.116]you know, people that are running businesses in small towns.
[00:07:07.558]They're entrepreneurs, and they need to start thinking
[00:07:09.046]about themselves that way.
[00:07:10.775]And we see an opportunity where
[00:07:12.768]we can come in and use our expertise
[00:07:14.475]in creating product, creating start-up companies,
[00:07:17.373]to take an idea, get it off the ground,
[00:07:20.429]but one of the secret sources we've figured out
[00:07:23.598]as part of Nebraska Global, Don't Panic Labs,
[00:07:25.730]is also this training aspect.
[00:07:28.520]Typically when we partner with a company,
[00:07:30.815]with the things that we've done in Lincoln and Omaha,
[00:07:33.852]we also offer education.
[00:07:36.892]So people can actually learn how to become
[00:07:38.850]the software engineer who can support the software ongoing.
[00:07:44.149]And that is a key differentiator,
[00:07:45.701]and we believe it's gonna be a key differentiator
[00:07:47.358]that can help us grow Greater Nebraska.
[00:07:50.149]So we see it as an opportunity
[00:07:51.635]where we can find those entrepreneurs,
[00:07:55.449]help them grow a company, help them train resources,
[00:07:59.268]and actually create businesses that are viable
[00:08:02.732]in Greater Nebraska, that can then thrive and grow
[00:08:05.847]and continue to build upon themselves.
[00:08:09.556]And I think that's a bit unique,
[00:08:11.293]it's a bit complicated, but I think in every town,
[00:08:15.977]you know, every town's got two or three
[00:08:18.540]or maybe more people who are
[00:08:20.165]just ripe and ready for this. Creative problem-solvers,
[00:08:22.531]and don't quite know how to
[00:08:25.464]turn that into something. Yes, yes.
[00:08:27.979]And you do.
[00:08:28.812]And we believe that we've figured out in, you know,
[00:08:32.430]certain scenarios exactly how to take those things
[00:08:35.101]and turn them and create viable businesses.
[00:08:39.578]Listen, we had an interesting discussion
[00:08:41.748]earlier this week.
[00:08:42.809]You and I had a chance to get together
[00:08:44.973]for a cup of coffee and connect some key colleagues.
[00:08:49.141]Doug Durham with Nebraska Global and Don't Panic,
[00:08:52.725]one of the more interesting guys I've met for a while.
[00:08:55.319]We called in my buddy Dr Tom Field
[00:08:58.161]who's the director of the Engler Agribusiness
[00:09:00.409]Entrepreneurship Program, which we've discussed often
[00:09:03.716]here on this program.
[00:09:05.496]And we talked about a number of collaborative opportunities.
[00:09:08.302]But I'm gonna tell you, I was especially touched
[00:09:12.023]when you and Doug talked about
[00:09:14.480]the importance of intersecting,
[00:09:17.218]colliding I think is actually the word you talked about,
[00:09:20.868]high-tech sciences with the humanities
[00:09:23.599]in building a successful enterprise.
[00:09:26.937]For those of us at the Rural Futures Institute,
[00:09:29.223]our big, very audacious goal is a thriving, high-touch,
[00:09:34.000]high-tech future for rural.
[00:09:37.460]And so I thought, "Man, you're talking our language here."
[00:09:42.390]And so I want you to talk a little bit
[00:09:44.095]about how you at Don't Panic Labs
[00:09:47.673]see that intersection and why it's important.
[00:09:49.981]Oh, geez, I don't know where to start with that one.
[00:09:51.694]I mean, the greatest successes that we've seen over time
[00:09:55.139]have come when someone with no particular technical skill
[00:10:01.992]bumps into somebody from our world
[00:10:04.382]who has some technical skill,
[00:10:06.029]and we see this pollination of ideas.
[00:10:09.968]We call it collisions.
[00:10:11.556]We love to see the collisions
[00:10:12.819]between the non-technical and the technical.
[00:10:16.689]And to back up just a hair, we're tending to create
[00:10:20.372]people who are very siloed.
[00:10:22.103]Very siloed in how they think about the world
[00:10:24.062]and how they see the world.
[00:10:25.429]You know, you go to school and you specialize
[00:10:27.595]very tightly around computer science,
[00:10:29.821]or, you know, software development.
[00:10:31.406]Sometimes learning more and more about less and less.
[00:10:33.073]Yeah, so you become very deeply knowledgeable,
[00:10:37.480]you know, about a specific subject.
[00:10:39.843]And that's great, because it enables us
[00:10:42.968]to do some really cool things
[00:10:44.767]with all those different areas.
[00:10:46.775]What it does, though, is it also prevents
[00:10:49.905]a little bit of the "aha" moment from happening.
[00:10:52.924]So what we like to see happen
[00:10:54.130]is the collision between people
[00:10:55.648]who have very different skill sets
[00:10:57.194]and can bring together these "aha" moments
[00:10:59.448]of, "Wait, you can do that with software,
[00:11:03.132]"and I have this idea around how to monitor cattle
[00:11:08.851]"to see if they have a bacterial infection."
[00:11:13.288]So when those two people collide we see new product,
[00:11:17.842]and then we know how to put some energy behind that
[00:11:19.564]to actually create new business
[00:11:21.223]out of that new product, and that's tremendously exciting.
[00:11:24.125]Well, I have to tell you, in that conversation
[00:11:27.407]I think Tom and I both walked away saying,
[00:11:30.501]"Here are some really capable tech guys,
[00:11:33.226]"that, by the way, are just fun to be around."
[00:11:34.761]Oh, geez. I appreciate that. (Chuck laughs)
[00:11:36.369]So I know that Doug had said that, you know,
[00:11:40.494]one of your priorities is attracting people to your firm,
[00:11:45.554]that yeah, you're always needing engineers
[00:11:47.647]but by the way, you're really interested
[00:11:49.871]in finding those folks with the people skills,
[00:11:52.138]the humanities foundation that helps
[00:11:55.576]make this universe of talents really work.
[00:12:00.635]So I think that's very exciting, and it's one of the reasons
[00:12:03.538]that I wanted to get together with you.
[00:12:04.955]Well, listen, Bill, we're gonna run out time
[00:12:07.070]in a little bit, but it's just been such a treat
[00:12:09.649]over the last couple of months
[00:12:10.887]to get to know you, to get to know your company,
[00:12:14.594]and I have to tell you, I so hope
[00:12:16.468]that the Rural Futures Institute and Don't Panic Labs
[00:12:19.900]have the opportunity to join hands
[00:12:22.001]around some of these things,
[00:12:23.117]because you're difference-makers, and I think you just bring
[00:12:27.470]a very different energy to the notion
[00:12:29.987]of what a successful rural community might look like.
[00:12:36.080]We say around here all the time, it's a no fairy tales deal.
[00:12:38.737]There has to be genuine economic opportunity
[00:12:41.295]generated in a community to make it work,
[00:12:43.671]and then the whole entrepreneurial environment
[00:12:47.248]touches all kinds of things, from healthcare to education
[00:12:50.219]to entertainment, humanities, and all that sort of thing.
[00:12:53.456]Yes. So anyway,
[00:12:54.921]we're delighted to be acquainted.
[00:12:56.016]Anything you'd like to add this morning?
[00:12:57.740]I feel the exact same way.
[00:12:59.080]I think there's a real opportunity for, you know,
[00:13:01.643]a relationship with the Rural Futures Institute
[00:13:03.493]to lead to some really interesting
[00:13:08.042]creative endeavors for sure.
[00:13:10.589]Really excited for the potential of that.
[00:13:14.781]You know, for the audiences out there,
[00:13:19.229]if you're an entrepreneur, we would love to hear from you,
[00:13:23.523]and if you don't think you're an entrepreneur
[00:13:24.919]but you've got an idea, we'd love to hear from you.
[00:13:27.900]We genuinely want to start to get out
[00:13:30.989]into Greater Nebraska and start making a difference,
[00:13:33.153]and so if you have any ideas of how to do that,
[00:13:37.278]we're all ears.
[00:13:39.604]If you've ever had a more important message
[00:13:41.436]from Catch Up With Chuck, I don't know what it would be,
[00:13:43.939]than hearing from Bill Udell and his team,
[00:13:46.509]that kind of invitation.
[00:13:48.110]Bill, this has been a real treat.
[00:13:50.470]Thank you for joining us. Yep.
[00:13:52.202]And, folks, I just encourage you
[00:13:53.931]to stay in touch with the Rural Futures Institute
[00:13:57.218]through our website, through Facebook, YouTube, Instagram,
[00:14:02.662]LinkedIn, and all of those tools that are so important.
[00:14:06.640]'Cause we're gonna be back in another week
[00:14:08.614]talking with real people about real places
[00:14:11.518]demonstrating that thriving rural communities
[00:14:14.116]are a legitimate best choice for worthwhile living.
[00:14:16.730]Thanks for joining us.

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Catch Up With Chuck | Episode 24

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