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NCKU’s Angel Fund Helps Students to Realize Their Entrepreneurial Dreams
NCKU’s Angel Fund Helps Students to Realize Their Entrepreneurial Dreams
Two university students who received Angel Fund offered by the Creativity, Innovation& Entrepreneurship Center (CIE Center) at National Cheng Kung University (NCKU) setting to chase entrepreneurial dreams finally paid off when they established their own business, Fandora, an on-line community for graphic artists.
The founders of Fandora, Steven Su（蘇晏良）from NCKU Institute of Computer and Communication Engineering and Adrian Chen（陳俊穎）from NCKU Institute of Physics mentioned that the training courses from NCKU and the NT$50,000 grant offered by Angel Fund enables them to develop our own brand after graduating.
Fandora was established in October, 2011, whose goal is to help artists to gain profits continuing their creation, according to Su. “People can easily find the works they like and interact with the artists in Fandora.”
Within two years, Fandora has become a famous brand and has been elected as the Star of Cultural and Creative Industry of the first session by the Ministry of Culture in Taiwan. Chen said, “Now, Fandora is the biggest graphic art-based platform in Taiwan, which owns about 2,000 artists, 20,000 members and more than 20,000 art works.”
“We believe in the power of art. Not everyone can create great art works, and also not everyone has the chance to own them,” according to Chen who added that Fandora offers both artists and the general public a chance to be seen and people can show their taste through owning art print products at an affordable price.
Every single sale will become the fund for the artist directly to support them create artworks, Su noted.
Sun and Chen have been well acquainted through participation in student affairs since college. Yet it was until they attended the courses of CIE Center and were inspired by the center’s founder, Professor Harold Szu, the entrepreneurial idea came to their mind. Chen said, Angel Fund was originally built for general business for speeding progress. Hence, in the beginning, they used the whole funding on purchasing equipment. However, compared with the other big companies such as IBM and HP which provide similar services, it’s not easy for them to gain trust from clients. Therefore, they reoriented themselves.
Su and Chen appreciated the assistance provided by CIE, so they can reify their ideas and create Fandora, combining the meanings of “Fan” and “Pandora box.” All members of Fandora are art-lovers and artists, and so far there are nearly 20,000 members. In the future, the variety of products will be broadened including notebook, book cover, and card etc, enabling customers to create their own personalized product. At present, the monthly income is about 400,000 NT dollars.
Su said, for now there are 4 partners including 3 graduates from NCKU and 1 from NTU. Concerning future progress, he has faith that their monthly income will be up to 10 million dollars.
In addition to the success of Fandora, CIE center has assisted more than 50 student entrepreneurial projects, which includes some newly-formed companies such as EatMe, Healthlife, and Liwi, and other cases like Jiongjiong mask designed by student from Department of Physics, children’s dental product design, Chinese-styled creative T-shirt, baseball groves for player Hong-Chih Kuo, Saving From Poverty Project, PhiStorage quantum cloud data system, Evergreen Life-kitchenware for single elders, and Soap Slicer-paper soap dispensers etc.
Two university students who received Angel Fund offered by the Creativity, Innovation& Entrepreneurship Center (CIE Center) at National Cheng Kung University (NCKU) setting to chase entrepreneurial dreams finally paid off when they established their own business, Fandora, an on-line community for graphic artists.
The founders of Fandora, Steven Su（蘇晏良）from NCKU Institute of Computer and Communication Engineering and Adrian Chen（陳俊穎）from NCKU Institute of Physics mentioned that the training courses from NCKU and the NT$50,000 grant offered by Angel Fund enables them to develop our own brand after graduating.
Fandora was established in October, 2011, whose goal is to help artists to gain profits continuing their creation, according to Su. “People can easily find the works they like and interact with the artists in Fandora.”
Within two years, Fandora has become a famous brand and has been elected as the Star of Cultural and Creative Industry of the first session by the Ministry of Culture in Taiwan. Chen said, “Now, Fandora is the biggest graphic art-based platform in Taiwan, which owns about 2,000 artists, 20,000 members and more than 20,000 art works.”
“We believe in the power of art. Not everyone can create great art works, and also not everyone has the chance to own them,” according to Chen who added that Fandora offers both artists and the general public a chance to be seen and people can show their taste through owning art print products at an affordable price.
Every single sale will become the fund for the artist directly to support them create artworks, Su noted.
Sun and Chen have been well acquainted through participation in student affairs since college. Yet it was until they attended the courses of CIE Center and were inspired by the center’s founder, Professor Harold Szu, the entrepreneurial idea came to their mind. Chen said, Angel Fund was originally built for general business for speeding progress. Hence, in the beginning, they used the whole funding on purchasing equipment. However, compared with the other big companies such as IBM and HP which provide similar services, it’s not easy for them to gain trust from clients. Therefore, they reoriented themselves.
Su and Chen appreciated the assistance provided by CIE, so they can reify their ideas and create Fandora, combining the meanings of “Fan” and “Pandora box.” All members of Fandora are art-lovers and artists, and so far there are nearly 20,000 members. In the future, the variety of products will be broadened including notebook, book cover, and card etc, enabling customers to create their own personalized product. At present, the monthly income is about 400,000 NT dollars.
Su said, for now there are 4 partners including 3 graduates from NCKU and 1 from NTU. Concerning future progress, he has faith that their monthly income will be up to 10 million dollars.
In addition to the success of Fandora, CIE center has assisted more than 50 student entrepreneurial projects, which includes some newly-formed companies such as EatMe, Healthlife, and Liwi, and other cases like Jiongjiong mask designed by student from Department of Physics, children’s dental product design, Chinese-styled creative T-shirt, baseball groves for player Hong-Chih Kuo, Saving From Poverty Project, PhiStorage quantum cloud data system, Evergreen Life-kitchenware for single elders, and Soap Slicer-paper soap dispensers etc.
