Jewel Burks
Co-Founder & CEO
Partpic Inc.
Atlanta, GA USA
“Don’t be frustrated with curves in the road...Try to find the glimmer of goodness in the bad turns.”
Videos
By Roadtrip NationJewel Burks
Milestones
My road in life took a while to figure out.
Attended Howard University; while she was there, she connected with an on-campus recruiter from Google.
Moved to Silicon Valley after college and realized that there was a whole “world” of tech-loving, entrepreneurial people like her, living in one place.
She was employed at Google for several years before deciding to leave to take a job in parts distribution.
Right when she started her new job, she realized she’d made a huge mistake—she freaked out and wondered why she’d left Google.
Decided that instead of giving into regret, she’d look at this new job from a Silicon Valley perspective: she’d use the job an opportunity to find a new idea and innovate the business.
She was working in the call center when she realized that people were struggling to describe the part that they needed—they wanted to take a picture of the part and send it to her.
Inspired by Shazam—the app that can “listen” to music and tell you which song is playing—she decided to build a visual search tool to match these pictures of parts to their distributors.
She gathered a team of engineers by networking and hanging out at nearby Georgia Tech; she eventually connected with her co-founder and together they started Partpic.
Keep following my journey
Education
High School
Career
Co-Founder & CEO
I am the co-founder of a startup that is using visual technology to streamline the purchase of repair parts.
Career Roadmap
My work combines:
My work combines:
Engineering
Science
Problem Solving
Day to Day
No two days are ever the same and the life of an entrepreneur is ever growing and evolving. Some days I work on our business model and ways to best market the company; I work to secure additional funding to grow the business; I recruit and manage our growing team; I develop timelines to ensure we are delivering results on time, etc.
Advice for Getting Started
Here's the first step for college students
Get involved whenever you can. Intern, network, join clubs. Wherever there are opportunities to learn more, go for it!
Hurdles
The Noise I Shed
From Myself:
"How did I get here? WHY am I here? "
Challenges I Overcame
Discrimination
Interviewed By
A Balanced Equation
Women in STEM careers
