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Noramay Cadena is uniquely qualified for empowering independent entrepreneurs.

Noramay co-founded Make In LA, Los Angeles’ first hardware accelerator, in Spring, 2015.  One of her two co-founders is entrepreneur and electronics manufacturing expert Shaun Arora.  She has three degrees (including Systems Engineering and Business) from MIT.  Her professional background also includes work as an aerospace engineer for Boeing.

But, perhaps her best qualification is the reason her Make In LA students might hesitate to say, “That’s impossible”.

Noramay went through MIT’s engineering program as a single mother, while she and her daughter lived on-campus.  When she attended her first engineering classes at MIT, her daughter was one year old.

Fast-forward to January, 2016.  Make In LA had just concluded its first four-month training program of four selected independent entrepreneur teams.  The culmination was “Hardware Demo Day”, where program graduates previewed their inventions to potential investors and the media.

Noramay talked about her background, her experiences creating Make In LA, and what independent entrepreneurs can expect, if selected for the free program.  She also gave some exciting resources for any independent entrepreneur!

On this episode of Over Coffee®, you’ll hear:

• What first inspired Noramay to become a mechanical engineer;

• How Noramay’s experience, raising her daughter at MIT, helps her coach entrepreneurs;

• How she and Shaun first came to create Make in LA;

• The experiences of one of their entrepreneurship teams, and what they learned;

• What’s been happening for the first class of entrepreneurs who went through the mentorship program;

• What entrepreneurs accepted into the program can expect;

• A preview of the companies accepted into the next mentorship sessions, which begin in March 2015;

• The resources Make In LA offers (including some free ones available to any entrepreneur!);

• The advice Noramay would give her now-seventeen-year-old daughter on building her career;

• Her goals for Make In LA and the communities it creates,  in the future.