Welcome to the Business Boot-Up Edition of The Dreamers and Doers Podcast! We believe you are never too young to start a business. We’re bringing you live interviews from the Norman Farmer’s Market in Norman, OK. Each episode will feature one of our student-run businesses where they will be sharing what they’ve learned by starting a business to encourage you to start yours too!

Sean Akadiri with Agric-Bioformatics INC

Sean Akadiri is the Founder, President and CEO of Agric-Bioformatics INC, a data analytics company in Oklahoma City. Sean is an Ag-Tech entrepreneur passionate about using data analytics to improve the performance and productivity of livestock.

Sean came to the U.S. from Nigeria when he was 19 years old, on a student visa to attend college. He received a Bachelor degree in Biology, and a minor in Chemistry from East Central University and earned his MBA from Mid-American Christian University. He also attended University of Oklahoma college of Engineering for 3 years studying Chemical Engineering. Sean has over 15 years’ experience in the biotech and life science industries, he is also on the advisory board for the Moore Norman Technology Center’s Biotechnology Program.

Patience, perseverance and commitment are the words Sean lives by.  He says, teamwork is an essential part of building your business because you can’t build a business by yourself.  Understanding your strengths and weaknesses, knowing who has the experience and building trusting relationships is the key to building a successful business.  If you can articulate your vision and people understand their role you can’t lose.

Jaden McIntyre and Jaymin Sattler with J+J Caricatures

Jaden and Jaymin became friends at the young age of 3 and enjoyed drawing cartoons together.  At the age of 8 they dreamed of starting a business.  Even when they could not be together they would spend hours via zoom dreaming and drawing their ideas.  Recently they came up with the idea of drawing caricatures and after hours of practice their dream of starting a business came to fruition at the first annual Norman Children’s Business Fair. 

Jaden was nervous about making the caricatures look like the people they were drawing but he found taking a break after working hard for a long time makes all the difference.  After such a break he had a breakthrough with his skills drawing caricatures that captured the likeness of his subject.

Afraid of judgement and to calm his nerves, Jaymin, closes his eyes and thinks of what the person would look like as a cartoon.  He loves seeing his subjects enjoy the drawing and happy to create something they will always remember.  

Their favorite thing about starting a business is the money, duh!  More importantly, making money makes more dreams and accomplishments possible.