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On today's Penn Professor success story, you'll hear the amazing story that sparked the idea for a product that Troy Electra turned into a profitable business.
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My name is Troy Solyndra. I'm founder of the company called The Rat, I created inflatable throwable devices that our US Coast Guard
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approved, Drake came up with the idea for the throw raft. After fighting to survive a life threatening situation he found himself in,
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I was ditching work one day on a Friday, and I was in a rush the night before, and I didn't put the bait pump back on the boat correctly, I ended up now miles offshore. And that was when I realized that my bow was full of water. And within five minutes, my bow was about 30 feet below my feet, it was either sit there and wait or start swimming towards land, and I chose to swim towards land. I did it for 16 hours. From there on, there was the mission of creating better safety products for all people that get on the water.
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This program was designed to help others that found themselves stranded and swimming long distances for survival. Troy was determined to turn his idea into reality. So he created a prototype and started demonstrating how his product would work.
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I started building prototypes, and six samples. So I go present, it didn't sell one product, I was crushed. And what I found was is that it wasn't that I wasn't on a good product, it was the fact that it wasn't Coast Guard approved,
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feeling somewhat defeated, true began the patenting process with John who helped in more ways than he expected.
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So that's where John came in. For me, especially in my darkest moment in my life, John said, you get one damn girl around in this life. One we've been choked out for long, have been through a lot. So it's tough to see come to life, you can never give up. No matter what happens. I lost my best friend. My dad, my wife, literally wants to park and what drove me was the stamp to arrest. And I never quit
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after a lot of hard work. But John Troy was able to get the throw ref pen and it was time to put it in front of the Coast Guard.
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We started testing with the US Coast Guard. Typically it takes two years to get the approval, it took 28
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days. With Coast Guard approval, the business really took off. Once I
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got that Coast Guard approval. It's it's grown significantly in the last eight months. I've got all the local fire departments. And right now I've got about 10 counties in the state of Florida, that are purchasing my products.
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The success of the product was one thing, but Troy never imagined the impact creating a business out of an idea would have on him personally.
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It feels amazing. Amazing every time I sell one, and coming into my office and seeing my team, and then understanding me as a person and then them living the passion with me. Being the leader of what we're doing is probably one of the most rewarding things any entrepreneur can freakin live with other than when people pay me for something that I create. It is the best feeling I've ever felt. And every time I sell one, I feel it.
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For more information, check out John's website, the patent professor.com or schedule your appointment with the patent Professor today by calling 1-877-379-6453 and let John make patenting easy for you