How New Orleans is Jumpstarting Innovation

Launching a business usually takes 12 to 18 months, but New Orleans companies are doing it in two weeks.

INNO has partnered with GNOpivot, a New Orleans initiative by Greater New Orleans, Inc. (GNO, Inc.). GNO, Inc.’s mission is to create and maintain jobs in New Orleans. GNOpivot’s goal is to help regional companies shift their business operations in order to make products or provide services to help “flatten the curve” of coronavirus infections in New Orleans.

Interview with GNOpivoten

Thomas Knoll, Revelry COO, hosted a pre-INNO event where he interviewed Grady Fitzpatrick, SVP of Business Development at GNO, Inc. and two of GNOpivot’s local New Orleans partners: Lyle LeBlanc, CEO of Scale Workspace and Aaron Dirks, CEO of Dirks Companies.

They talked about New Orleans as a place of innovation. Lyle and Aaron were able to jump on opportunities to help fight COVID-19 by pivoting their businesses within a matter of days using their existing resources and networks.

Watch their recorded conversation here:

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New Orleans is Better Together

Over the past 15 years, New Orleans has faced Katrina, the BP oil spill, and many other disasters that have proven over and over again the resiliency of its citizens. Everyone had to come together to respond to each crisis. To help neighbors and rebuild. The mantra New Orleanians have adopted is, “we’re all in this together.”

Over time, locals have gained a muscle memory that enables them to respond quickly and jumpstart innovation. Local business owners are perfectly geared to startup and scale fast.

“We’ve taken this problem, and we are solving it in a very collaborative way,” said Grady Fitzpatrick about New Orleans’ response to demand for goods and services driven by COVID-19.

“It’s nothing without the people,” said Lyle. “[I’m] lucky to have relationships with these people [and companies] before the shit hit the fan.”

Coming Together: GNOpivot

GNO, Inc. created GNOpivot in response to COVID-19. GNOpivot helps regional companies move to “war-footing,” wherein they pivot their standard operations in order to make products or provide services in demand for the regional fight against the coronavirus. GNOpivot matches companies to regional entities that can use their services, including hospitals, governments and public agencies, and private companies.

To accomplish this, GNOpivot is helping companies get their products to market by filling in any gaps by playing matchmaker. They created a database where innovators and solution providers can meet to bring ideas to market fast. These companies are pivoting to make PPE and hand sanitizer. This keeps these companies thriving and their teams employed.

Here are two examples of GNOpivot partnerships at work:

Lyle’s team at Scale Workshop creating PPE for Ochsner Health
Aaron’s team creating and bottling hand sanitizer for Sysco and 7-Eleven

Scale Workspace Creating PPE for Ochsner

Scale Workspace is a unique coworking space in that members have access to a maker’s space on the first floor with 3D printing, fabrication technology, and workspace.

The Mission of Scale Workspace is to support and encourage the physical production of innovative products, devices, designs, and art right here in New Orleans.

Identifying an Opportunity

The Scale team had worked with Ochsner in the past, so they already had an established relationship. On March 16, Lyle sensed an opportunity and framed up a question to Ochsner: “should we try to make face masks?” The health care professionals responded and said, “give us face shields. We need a clear barrier between us and patients.”

Customer Insights

Lyle and his team observed that there was a disconnect between health care professionals and their administrators and supply chain. At first, the administration said we don’t need any homemade face shields.

Identifying the Real Problem

Turns out, not only did the hospital not have any face mask inventory, but the price and lead times were going up. The opportunity then became, what can you do and how fast can you go?

designing prototypes

Lyle and team assembling prototypes

Feasibility

Quantity and depth of the face mask evolved quickly due to the number of coronavirus patients growing daily in New Orleans. The need shot up from 15 to 15,000 face masks.

By March 26, Lyle’s team had already:

Shipped: three rounds of prototypes
Learned: 50 units tested at one of Ochsner’s COVID ICUs
Iterated: received feedback directly from the doctor on the ground, then made changes and had already started production on the first order

Viability

By day 10, Scale was delivering 1260 units a day.

Paying it Forward with Open Source

Scale is also helping seed their 3D printing files by making them Open Source. The files are freely available to folks in other communities around the country.

old prototype

current model

Aaron Dirks Pivots to Make Hand Sanitizer

Aaron Dirks leads his portfolio of entrepreneurial endeavors through his role as Founder and CEO of Dirks Companies. Aaron is a partner of the Louisiana Pepper Exchange, which had recently put in a brand new bottling line for items like 3.5oz jars of minced garlic. Since the COVID-19 outbreak, that initiative has been delayed.