Harold Hughes is the founder & CEO of Bandwagon, a South Carolina-based live experience technology company. Under his leadership, Bandwagon has raised more than $3M in venture capital and successfully acquired IdealSeat, Inc. in 2020. Their customers include Fortune 50 brands, entertainers, as well as professional and collegiate athletes. As a first-generation American, Harold prioritized education, receiving two Bachelors degrees (Economics and Political Science) from Clemson University and later received his MBA from Clemson while he led business development at a Fortune 1000 company based in Greenville, South Carolina. As a web3 builder and community leader, Harold published "A Kids Book About Blockchain" to help educate people "from 6 to 60" about the revolutionary technology that Bandwagon specializes in.
To that end, Harold is also an active angel investor, primarily investing in women, people of color, and Black founder-led companies. Most notably, he has invested in Partake Foods, the Jay-Z-backed CPG company making allergy-friendly snacks, and companies like Goodr, Chipper, Athletic Greens, Republic, Stix, and the National Cycling League.
Speaking Topics:
People Are Buying JPGs?!: WTF are NFTs
While many of us are still navigating our pandemic wardrobe, a new wave of technology has become prominent and flat-out unavoidable. NFTs or Non-Fungible Tokens are here — thanks to Blockchain — and given their variety of use cases, they are here to stay. NFTs are currently being used as a way for artists to participate in the value creation of their work in perpetuity, allowing communities to token-gate their access, and allowing brands to connect more directly with their customers. In this session, we will learn what NFTs are, what they can do, and how you can keep these new valuable digital assets safe.
Knowing your Superpower: Teambuilding for CEOs
Building a great team is more important than anything that you do as an early stage Founder and Harold has learned that first-hand. From hiring his first team member to dealing with firing and a bad fit, Harold will talk about how to tap into your superpowers to create an extraordinary team. Takeaways will include strategies for interviewing candidates, modeling for early team member compensation, and more.
Underestimated: Keys to Navigating Being a Person of Color in Tech
As a first-generation American and son to Jamaican parents, Harold knows what it is like to overcome challenges. Being one of 5 children growing up in Columbia, South Carolina, he understood what it was like to grow up without some of the key resources that he needed. Now, an entrepreneur, Harold shares his story with others as well as his hacks for overcoming the challenges of being a person in color in tech as it relates to growing your network, raising capital, and getting in the door with your first customer.
Crowdfunding for Success
Often times early stage startup founders are stuck between needing funding to get to their next milestone and needing to achieve a milestone to secure more funding. This catch-22 often leaves founders in a position that can stagnate if not signal the end for their startup. Harold has run several crowdfunding campaigns (both reward-based and for equity) and his gameplan for proper execution has helped him and his teams raise hundreds of thousands of dollars. Takeaways will include a pre-campaign playbook as well as strategies for staying top of mind from campaign launch until the day you close.
Blockchain Beyond the Coin
Like many great innovations, the first use case isn’t always the best one. Harold and his team have navigated the adoption of blockchain technology in an enterprise environment to show that crypto doesn’t only mean cryptocurrencies. Harold will share his thoughts on permissioned-blockchains, Zero-Knowledge Proof, and other enterprise level solutions in the blockchain space.
Stadium as a Service: The Future of Technology in Venues & Arenas
Today, stadiums and arenas are more than just large slabs of concrete poor cellular reception…or at least, they should be. With technological advancements, fans are finding better ways to enjoy live events outside of attending in-person. That challenge leaves these multi-million dollar stadiums becoming less and less full on the day of the event. But where most see problems, Harold sees opportunities for stadiums and arenas to use their platforms and captive audiences to deliver immense value to fans, brands, and sponsors.
