Founder Serendipity Picnic BlanKIT. Serial entrepreneur. Investor. Partnership and ecosystem builder. Life-long learner. Adventurer.
Honored and excited to join advisory board for The University of Nebraska-Lincoln Center for Entrepreneurship. Supporting entrepreneurs and helping build small businesses has been my passion and work for the past two decades. Thrilled to work together with the innovative team at my alma mater.
We are so excited to welcome Mary Lynn Fernau, MLS, '85, to our advisory board! Mary Lynn is a graduate of the Nebraska College of Journalism and Mass Communications and is a lifelong entrepreneur. Her first company, The Student Survival Kit, was launched after graduating from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and was eventually acquired by Valpak. In 2000, she founded a successful strategy and marketing firm for clients, including Korn Ferry, AIG, Texas Children's Hospital and National Space Coalition. Additionally, she launched Whose Shoes ID, which ignited a national child identification campaign widely featured by major news outlets and was adopted in evacuation policies for Houston and New York City. She currently serves as the CEO of The Fernau Group, offering startup and growth consulting, and co-founder of Serindipity Picnic, a patented blanket that rolls to become your basket. Since 2000, Fernau has been active in the Houston entrepreneurship community. She led the external relations and communications efforts for the Rice Alliance for Technology and Entrepreneurship at Rice University and collaborated with Houston’s innovation district cornerstone, The Ion. She fostered partnerships with more than 180 investors, corporations, academic and government organizations, whom assisted over 3,300 startups that raised nearly $26 billion in investment dollars and created over 6,500 jobs. She is a member of nCourage Investment Group, dedicated to funding women-led companies, and introducing women to the investment arena. Additionally, she is committed to her local community working with neighbors to build an engaged and prosperous neighborhood. She also earned her master's degree in liberal studies from Rice University in 2015. She and her husband, Michael, have two children.
