{"id":342199,"date":"2017-05-29T21:30:37","date_gmt":"2017-05-29T13:30:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/techcrunch.com\/?p=1496701"},"modified":"2017-05-29T21:30:37","modified_gmt":"2017-05-29T13:30:37","slug":"saluting-veteran-founders-and-their-mission-driven-startups","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/people.utm.my\/asmawisham\/saluting-veteran-founders-and-their-mission-driven-startups\/","title":{"rendered":"Saluting veteran founders and their mission-driven startups"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Next Story<\/p>\n

Asus skips robots at this year\u2019s Computex event and flaunts super-thin laptops\u00a0instead<\/h4>\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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Craig Hanson<\/span> Contributor<\/span><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

Craig Hanson is a general partner of Next World Capital<\/a>.<\/p>\n

More posts by this contributor:\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

As Military Appreciation month wraps up for May and we recognize Memorial Day, I wanted to recount an experience I had judging a hackathon for military veterans run by VetsinTech and hosted at Facebook.<\/p>\n

Reflecting on the entrepreneurs I heard pitch at this and other veteran events I\u2019ve participated in as a venture capitalist and advisor, I noticed a strong difference in the companies founded by military veterans \u2014 veterans are much more likely than others to create a company with a founding mission of social good\u200a.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s \u200aa perspective echoed by Executive Director of VetsinTech, Katherine Webster. The question I wanted to answer was why these veterans were more likely to launch a company focused on social impact.<\/p>\n

To begin with, military veterans are much more likely to become entrepreneurs than others. A 2011 Small Business Administration (SBA) study<\/a> concluded that \u201cveterans are at least 45 percent more likely than those with no active-duty military experience to be self-employed\u201d, and 13% of all small business owners are military veterans, according to research by Martin Bressler in the Academy of Entrepreneurship Journal<\/a>.<\/p>\n