"Let all your doubts happen before you commit" with Miral Kotb
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Miral Kotb is a female entrepreneur who used her life-long love of dance and computer coding to create the global dance sensation iLuminate. Kotb has battled uncertain times being a two-time cancer survivor over the years but still managed to create something beautiful during this time. iLuminate were finalists on America’s Got Talent and Kotb is preparing to take their show to the bright lights of the Las Vegas Strip.
Can you tell our readers about your background?
Dancing has always been a part of my culture. Before my parents emigrated from Cairo to Houston, my Father was a performer in Egypt's national dance troupe. My Mother is an economist, which I feel is where I got my love for math and science. When I was nine, my parents brought home our first desktop computer and I was hooked! They enrolled me in a computer coding class and I quickly began writing code for fun and making my own games. When people played the games I created, it felt communal and was another part of bonding myself into American culture.
While growing up, I continued to dance and eventually landed at Columbia University to continue my path with coding and dancing. I eventually took my knowledge to Bloomberg as a software engineer and kept dancing and honing my skills in my free time. I had finally reached a point where I was ready to leave my job at Bloomberg and put all my time into turning my passion for dance into a career when my life would change forever in the form of a tumor in my right hip. Sarcoma. The diagnosis was so bad there was a potential for my leg to be amputated and I’d never be able to dance again.
Surgeons were able to successfully remove my tumor and treat the area with radiation. I continued with Bloomberg for six years before becoming a freelancer focusing on website coding which I did while traveling around Europe. After returning to America, I decided to attend Apple’s App Developer Conference. App coding had fascinated me as it allowed me to create a game or application that could have an instant, world-wide audience. At the conference, I learned about wireless chips getting so small that they could be put in everyday devices and my mind instantly went to dance. You could put a chip on a dancer and be able to communicate with them wirelessly in real-time while performing. This would make shows more organic and different every night. I then cultivated that idea into having the chips control lights attached to the dancers; and with that, iLuminate was born.
What inspired you to start your business?
The concept for iLuminate emerged while I was developing iPhone applications. The art of dance, which I hold so close to my heart and technology, my other love, collided to create this immersive and unforgettable performance experience. While using my friends as guinea pigs, I created a prototype in a matter of weeks. And once I saw the potential, I went for it! This eventually led to a slew of celebrities wanting to use the technology and our placing 3rd on America’s Got Talent.
Where is your business based?
iLuminate is world-wide! We’ve performed on stages across the globe and in everyone’s living room. We have dancers around the country, including New York, Atlanta and Los Angeles. Our next project is opening a show on the Las Vegas Strip at Planet Hollywood.
How did you start your business? What were the first steps you took?
Like my battle with cancer, I refused to let anything get in my way. After the initial light suits were created for iLuminate, I got a few of my dancer friends to wear them and created a video. The video made its rounds in the entertainment industry, which led to an opportunity to outfit dancers for an award show performance with Christina Aguilera. Which sounds awesome in theory, but fell flat. Second client? Katy Perry. Which again sounds awesome in theory, but also didn’t quite work. If I have learned anything over the years, you have to commit when you decide to do something and that sometimes involves an entire team needing to listen to each other and be on the same page. These situations helped me learn that not only did I need that team, but I didn’t care who was asking, there was a way that we had to present iLuminate and moving forward, I would put up the fight to make sure things were done right. I knew the potential iLuminate had.
I was approached by two well-known choreographers for another award show performance with an unnamed performer. At first, I said no; I knew award shows wouldn’t go completely dark which at the time was imperative for the full effect of the light suits and what led to the ho-hum use of the suits in the past. The choreographers were insistent and I took everything I learned from my previous failures to make this work. The performer turned out to be Chris Brown, making his first comeback performance with a tribute to Michael Jackson at the BET Awards. The performance was a huge success and gave me the confidence to know iLuminate was worth pursuing again. This was about the same time that America’s Got Talent had expressed interest to have iLuminate compete on the show.
The success of iLuminate’s run on America’s Got Talent brought many opportunities our way. We also toured with Chris Brown, opened a show in New York, and that was only the beginning.
What has been the most effective way of raising awareness for your business?
I’ve been very lucky to have an incredible team by my side – from my amazing agents to all of the marketing teams we have worked with, to the dancers and choreographers, hardware engineers, software developers, technicians – this all reinforces the fact that we need a team to make iLuminate shine bright! My agents keep iLuminate in the market and we’ve built a business around private and corporate events, alongside our traditional show performances. Another key element is to constantly be creating and utilizing innovations to keep the shows fresh.
What have been your biggest challenges and how did you overcome them?
Years after my first fight with cancer, I was diagnosed a second time, this time with leukemia that was caused from the radiation from the first cancer. This was in 2017 and I was one of the youngest people known to get this particular type of leukemia. During the fight I decided to make a video of my story to say thank you to everyone who helped me and to remind me that life is worth living and this too shall pass. It reminded me that love and people will get you through anything. I was in quarantine for nine months and while it was torture, it also gave me time to be with my family, think and create. Shortly after getting out of the hospital, I started to put my iLuminate team to work for the show in Las Vegas.
How do you stay focused?
I’m a creature of habit and mindfulness is so important for me. I make sure to give myself time to play a puzzle, learn piano, read a book. I also still work through having ADHD so I find I have to exercise my mind to keep that focus and get to a calm place. Yoga and dance helps with that as well.
How do you differentiate your business from the competition?
If you let competition force you into action, all it would do is drive you crazy and that kind of energy isn’t good, but I will say that competition makes iLuminate better. I focus on what I can do to improve upon my product and stay ahead of the technology – costumes, choreography, and creativity.
What has been your most effective marketing strategy to grow your business?
This is a business so I keep my team at the top of their game professionally and we focus on customer service for our corporate clients which differentiates us for some of the other performing acts in the world and garners great word-of-mouth and repeat clients.
What's your best piece of advice for aspiring and new entrepreneurs?
Let all your doubts happen before you commit. Once you’ve committed to pursuing something, don’t look back.
What's your favorite app, blog, and book? Why?
My favorite app is Tetris. It’s about putting things together and making them fit, just like life!
What's your favorite business tool or resource? Why?
Spreadsheets! Organizing data is fun for me.
Who is your business role model? Why?
Richard Branson. He’s an artist at heart and you can tell how he approaches business from a creative stand point. I think of myself as an artist as well in every move I make.
How do you balance work and life?
I don’t always! My fiancé calls me out on things and lets me know when I’m not being present. He reminds me that the tasks will be there tomorrow and I can take time to step away and give myself a break. Finding a partner that helps keep you balanced is so important.
What’s your favorite way to decompress?
Give me a great detective thriller, a comfy seat and lots of sunshine and I am a happy woman!
What do you have planned for the next six months?
In keeping up with technology and what comes next, right now we are creating new hardware and writing new code to improve on the new light suits for the Las Vegas show. We are also focusing on creating an education program. Over the past 10 years, I have seen what works and can ask myself, “How can we make it better and build a better system?”
How can our readers connect with you?