Every quarter, Sacramento State’s Carlsen Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship hosts The Startup Challenge—a fast-paced, hands-on competition where teams build a company from scratch in just one weekend. Running in parallel with the Traction Cohort for existing ventures, the Challenge pushes participants to learn entrepreneurship by doing, not by talking about doing.
This fall’s event ran from Friday, September 26th through Sunday, September 28th, and drew more than 80 participants from across the region. Teams were formed Friday night, each with up to seven members, and had just 48 hours to test assumptions, validate markets, and build momentum.

A few years back, I won first place in the Carlsen Center’s Traction Cohort with my startup Purpurātus. The experience completely reshaped how I approach customer discovery. This time, I wanted to start from square one with a brand-new idea.
On Friday night, I pitched Site.AR — a service using image-to-3D modeling and existing blueprints to digitize heritage sites and monuments. Visitors could explore them in browser or VR/AR, with proceeds shared with those who maintain the real-world sites. It was ambitious and deeply personal — but no one joined the team.
Instead, I found myself with a group developing the Moonlight Design Collective, a design agency that hires recent graduates and architecture students to offer professional design services under mentorship, at a fraction of standard market rates. The idea: create work opportunities for new designers who are struggling due to lack of a portfolio, while providing affordable creative solutions to local businesses.

By Saturday morning, every team had their goals and business assumptions mapped out — and then the real work began. From 8 a.m. to 10 p.m., participants fanned out across Sacramento to test their ideas in the wild.
Collectively, over 500 customer interviews were conducted that weekend, testing more than 30 different business assumptions. Our team discovered that while potential clients were drawn to Moonlight’s low cost, they were equally — if not more — motivated by the opportunity to support local students and universities. It was a pleasant surprise, and it changed how we framed the value of our service. It was fun to have an excuse to go outside and do some light interviews with excited cofounders, and it was really fulfilling to see them get their first “a-ha” moments in person. It was really rewarding for everyone who went out.
Sunday was all about refining presentations and preparing for the final pitches. Each team had just three minutes to present their findings, followed by three minutes of questions from the judges.

After an evening of twenty presentations, the Moonlight Design Collective was announced as the first-place winner of the Startup Challenge. We worked really hard on the presentation, so I was really stoked to be rewarded for that! Most of the groups did fantastic, but I think we had an extra edge due to my experience coaching startups on their pitching/presenting.
For me, the experience was a powerful reminder that even as a returning participant, there’s always more to learn. I realized I’d grown a little too comfortable with my own assumptions — and this Challenge pulled me back to what matters most: testing ideas in the real world.
Entrepreneurship is about learning, iterating, and never letting yourself get complacent.

It was an absolute blast. I gave it my all, and couldn’t be happier with the result. The team I worked with will be continuing the project, so I know the prize money and in-kind resources are going to a great cause.

CleanStart is proud to partner with the Carlsen Center in fostering the next generation of innovators. While our primary focus is on clean tech and sustainable startups, we’ll never spurn an entrepreneurial spirit. Events like the Startup Challenge nurture that spark — giving emerging founders the tools, network, and confidence they need to take the next step, no matter the sector.
These are the programs that make Sacramento’s innovation ecosystem thrive.
I’ll be participating in these startup challenges more regularly, and would love to see you at the next one!