OLEG SHEVKUN:
On FSCast episode 263, Ryan Jones unveils some of the new features in JAWS, ZoomText, and Fusion. Elizabeth Whitaker demonstrates the account and registration experience and previews upcoming training opportunities. And Colleen Wunderlich of the Chicago Lighthouse presents an exciting initiative which might turn your business ideas into reality.
So hello and welcome to FSCast for October 2025. I am Oleg Shevkun.
Yes, it is October. It is almost late fall, and the days are getting shorter and it's also getting colder, at least here where I live. And I don't know about you, but I really enjoy reading. And the longer and darker the evenings, the more I like to read. And not just to consume information, but also to take notes, to organize my books, to leave bookmarks, and then go back to those bookmarks. So all the things that have to do with not just reading, but also annotating and managing your books, and articles, and other materials.
And right now, before talking about the JAWS and ZoomText and Fusion 2026 update, I'm going to shamelessly use FSCast for personal purposes. Well, not quite personal. I do hope to publish what comes out of it in November. But it definitely originates from my personal interest. So I'd like to ask you a question. What software do you use to read, and annotate, and manage your library collections on your computer? Well, I know about software for Android and I know about software for iOS. It's all nice and good, but sometimes you do want to not just read, but also to write your notes, to interact with the material. And maybe I'm old fashioned, but I still like to use my Windows PC for those purposes. I do have one software package in mind, something that I'm using pretty much on a daily basis. In fact, I was going to make a review of this package here on FSCast, but I'm also noticing that it's got some shortcomings. It's not doing some of the things I'd like it to do.
And so before putting together a review, I'd like to know your experience. Do you read books on a Windows computer? If so, what software packages are you using for this? Do those software packages allow you to open books and materials in different formats such as EPUB, PDF, DAISY, and potentially others? Do they allow you to annotate your reading materials? And if you're using those features, I would also like to find out whether you're finding them efficient or comfortable to use. Suppose you're reading something today and you find an idea that you would like to come back to maybe several years down the road. Have you found a way to mark that location so that you can easily find it later? Or is it most likely going to be lost in the myriads of other things you're reading or consulting?
In short, my question is: what software are you using to read books, magazines, articles, and other materials on your Windows computer? How accessible is it? And do you have any tips and tricks you would like to share with me and with other FSCast listeners? If you've got something to say about this, send us an email to fscast@vispero.com. You can also record your thoughts as an MP3 file, upload it to OneDrive or Google Drive and just send us a link. I personally look forward to hearing from you and learning from your experience. And also, I think it's going to be a good idea to share it right here on FSCast in the upcoming November episode.
Our Fusion 2026 update is coming out these very days, and I'm not saying today, I'm kind of deliberately vague on this because we have a soft rollout and that means that... Well, what that means and what's happening with this update, we're going to ask Ryan Jones, our Senior Vice President of Global Accessibility Strategy and Advocacy. Ryan, hello and welcome to FSCast.
RYAN JONES:
Hi Oleg. I'm really thrilled to be here again. I love coming on here with you and talking about all things going on at Vispero.
OLEG:
So let's start with the Fusion Suite, and that's JAWS, ZoomText, and Fusion proper. We're now releasing 2026 version of Fusion Suite. And we, for the first time, are doing what's called soft rollout. And that's going to affect some of our users, and that means that not all of the customers will be getting the updates at the same time. Could you explain what is going on and why?
Ryan:
This is a technique that most software companies use when they push out updates or new releases. And there are two ways that someone gets a new update or a new release when it comes out from us. One is the product JAWS, ZoomText, or Fusion will alert you that there's a new version. So when the product starts, there'll be a message that says there's a new version available and you'll have the choice to download, install it at that time, or you can cancel it if you don't have time then to do it. So in the product, there's a way to update it, or you can always go to our website if you're in the US or an English speaker or the dealer's website if you're getting your product internationally through one of our distributors. And you can just download the actual installation file and run it, and it will install the new version 2026 that way as well. Either way works, no difference in the ultimate outcome of getting the new version.
But what we're doing with the soft rollout is for the people who receive updates. So if you have JAWS 2025, as I said, you would receive an update notification when you start JAWS. We're only going to turn on a certain percentage of people at first who will get that notification. So let's just say it's 10% in the first week. So over the first week or so, about 10% of people would get that notification when JAWS starts that says, "Hey, there's an update. Do you want to go and install it?" And you could choose to do it, or again, you could wait to do it. But not everyone would get that notification at first. And then over time, more and more people will start to get that notification. And so, that sort of staggers how many people are downloading and installing the update at one time.
And it's a way that companies just manage these releases and manage these updates so that not everyone is doing something at the exact same time. We've done some versions of this in the past, but we're going to do it full on this time. So if you want to download and install the 2026 version and the product did not tell you that it's available, you can always go to the website or the website of your international distributor and get the download there and install it. It will work that way even if you're not notified. But eventually, by probably the end of November, everyone will be notified within the product that the update is available to them.
OLEG:
And actually that type of updating is nothing new for Windows users. When we receive major updates to Windows from Microsoft, that's exactly what's happening. Some people will get them earlier, some people will get them later. But then, of course, you can enroll in Microsoft programs to get that. So the same is now going to be available for our Fusion products.
Something else that's coming to US customers, that's not Canada at this point, is the new user experience. Can you talk more about this?
Ryan:
Yeah, absolutely. So this is something that I'm really excited about. We've been working on this for a while. We've been wanting to do this for a number of years and we're happy we've been able to get it going. And so, I'll talk about what it is and then the rollout strategy for this. So one of the challenges that we often see these days because, Oleg, you mentioned this about operating system updates, Windows updates, browser updates, Office updates, all of these things are updating quite often the background. And sometimes those updates break certain functionality with JAWS, or ZoomText, or Fusion. In fact, Oleg, we've been on this show before talking about those things over the past couple of years where there was an update to your browser and it broke an ability for JAWS, one of its functionalities in that browser. And so then we'd have to put out an emergency update of JAWS to correct whatever the browser change that happened is. Or we would tell people don't update to this new version of Windows, or don't update to this new version of Office, because there's a problem with it still.
So we have a lot of communication that we need to do to help everyone stay efficient and productive and help things work smoothly with our technology and the mainstream technology around us. But we didn't have a good way to communicate with people to reach everyone because we don't know who all the users are. So we are introducing a registration and account creation process in the 2026 version of Fusion Suite, so JAWS, ZoomText, and Fusion. And you will now have the opportunity to create an account when you use the product. And by registering and creating that account, we will now be able to contact you about important updates. If there's a critical update that we have to put out, let's just say in December for whatever reason, we can now reach you, we can email you, we can send out information to people to let them know what's going on and help you stay efficient and stay current with your software.
And that's something we've not been able to do in the past. So that's going to be a really big benefit to everyone. And the other thing this sets us up for is down the road future-facing functionality. And I'll mention this a little bit later as well, but there's some great things coming and some great things in AI that are opening up to users down the road and things around personalization. Products are becoming more personal. They know how you interact with them. And so we want to be able to do that with the Fusion Suite products. But in order to do that, we have to have an account, we have to have an identity, who is the person that's using the product? That way we can make it more personal and let it learn about how Oleg uses JAWS, or how Ryan uses JAWS, and not just something more generic. And so this account creation or registration process sets the stage for that.
Another one I can think of is: let's just say you want to save your settings. I'm not saying we're going to do this or exactly when, but that'll come later. But we may have the ability where you can back up your settings to the cloud. Many of us change a lot about how JAWS or ZoomText is configured, and we don't want to have to recreate those settings or move them on a thumb drive when we switch to a new computer, or if we lose our computer, or whatever. So we may have the ability to save those things to the cloud and then easily download those settings the next time you use a different computer. But for any of that to even be a possibility for us, we have to have accounts.
So this is rolling out in the US first, and then as we go down through the next number of months, it will start to become available to international users. One of the key things for us is making sure that we're complying with privacy regulations and other regional regulations around data handling. And so we're starting with the US, and then we'll be rolling this out to other regions around the world going forward.
OLEG:
Now, how about customers in corporate environments or restricted environments, and how about customers who are not connected to the internet?
Ryan:
So obviously, for some of our customers that are behind high security networks and things where their products aren't reaching out to the internet, they won't have to register. They won't have to create an account, and that functionality will be disabled. And then there are certain enterprises where we may be talking to them about the right way to support this and get the right functionality for them as well. So we're working with some of those individually.
When you install it, the product will prompt you to create an account and to register. The process is very straightforward. And actually for many users, you already have an account.
So for anyone in the US in particular who's using the Home annual license, you already have an account with us. So it'll be just a matter of signing in and adding some additional information to your account. And for those who don't have an account, the process is simple. We also have it where you can use your Google account, so if you have a Gmail address, you can use that to sign in. You don't even have to create your own password. There's a lot of flexibility here, but I'm really excited because this paves the way for a lot of things to come.
OLEG:
Another feature that's coming up in our 2026 update for JAWS and Fusion is Page Explorer, and we've been talking about Page Explorer extensively. We've been adding new functionality and we've actually got a chance to see where this feature really shines. So how would you describe Page Explorer, and who is this meant for, and how is this going to be helpful?
Ryan:
Yeah, page Explorer is one, like you said, we've been working on for some time now. And it's a way to allow AI to interpret what's on the page that's in front of me. So if I'm on a web application of some sort, AI Page Explorer will look at everything that's on that page and it can give me an overview of how that page is structured. It can give me an overview of the content that's on that page, and then even let me ask follow-up questions to better understand the structure. And what we discovered is that this is a really great productivity tool for those who are in situations where you're dealing with complex websites. So think about if you're at work and you're dealing with your HR site where you may be entering your timesheet or approving time off requests, or if you're doing online training of some sort. All of us have to do IT security training, for example. In fact, we just had to do one recently. And so, this is a great way when you have these complex interfaces to quickly get an overview of how the page is structured, what types of structural elements are there, their headings, or their landmarks, those sorts of things.
Another good example that we've seen this is in ticketing systems. So if you're using a tracking system for IT tickets or for software development teams, just like our own, we use different tools to track the development work. And they're often very complicated sites, very complicated pages with a lot of information, a lot of things on them. And AI Page Explorer has been helping get people acquainted and familiar with those things. And then even, like I said, ask follow-up questions to make sure you understand how that page is structured.
And so, this is going to be available now in our Pro edition, our Professional edition, and then also the Home edition of JAWS, ZoomText, and Fusion because that's where we see the most use and the intended use, obviously, for employment settings, for students and schools for example. This will be a great benefit for using things like Blackboard or other LMS systems where you've got a lot of information, a lot of complexity. I've seen a number of online school applications, learning applications that students use that are very complicated, lots going on, it's very hard to understand the screen with JAWS. Page Explorer is helping that. And so, it's going to be available in the Pro edition and the Home edition.
OLEG:
So in the next couple of months, we'll be talking more about the Fusion 2026 release, but are there any other highlights you would like to mention today?
Ryan:
Yeah, I think there's a few other things that, as you said, there'll be a lot more coming out over the next month or so with more in-depth information and tutorials or training webinars on these things. But some highlights are the AI Labeler. This is something that I know, Oleg, you've demonstrated here on FSCast before. This is something we've had in our early adopter program for the last few months, but it's now fully available to everyone by default in JAWS or Fusion. And it's a way to have AI label things on the web that were not labeled well for you. We all come across things on the web where there's an unlabeled edit box or a button that says unlabeled zero button or a checkbox, and we can't tell what the checkbox is for. The AI Labeler tool will use some algorithms and take a screenshot, and parse the code of the web page up, and it will determine what that thing is.
And so that's a really good thing to help us no matter what you're doing with JAWS, whether you're shopping online and you're not sure if this is the buy button or whether you're doing something at work and there's a control that's not accessible to you. Anywhere you're at, whatever stage of life or whatever things you use your computer for, the AI Labeler will be beneficial when we come across those things. So that's one. Another, we've made some great updates to the Fusion UI for those of you who use Fusion, which is JAWS and ZoomText running together. We brought out some of the magnification and braille functionality into a toolbar and made it more visible, made it easier to find for people. So there's some good benefits there if you're a Fusion user. We also added better support for Java applications. So if you don't know what I'm talking about, that's okay. You probably don't use Java. But some people have to use applications developed in the Java language. And so we've added some good support to make that work better.
And of course, all the normal updates under the hood to make sure that the products are working with the latest browser versions, and operating system, and Office, all the normal things that we do every release. So there's a lot of stuff here packed into this 2026 update. And there'll be a lot more really good things to come. And to kind of bring that out a little bit more, we'll be sharing a lot more about our roadmap and future functionality that's to come. In fact, some of you may have noticed when Oleg did the introduction that I have a new title at Vispero. So I'm actually going to be focusing on some strategy work at the company now, and we are excited that we brought in a new vice president of product. Oleg, you'll probably have him on the show before long and I'll let him introduce himself. But he's working on some of our future forward-facing technology, whether that's around AI or other feature functionality in the product. He's working on some of those things right now and on what that roadmap looks like as we go over the next few months and years. And so, I think you're going to hear more about that fairly soon over the coming weeks and maybe a couple of months. So again, as I said, talking about accounts and registration, we're trying to set things up to get us ready for a lot of these things coming down the road.
OLEG:
That's exciting. One question some of our users may ask is, how do I know if I'm authorized for JAWS 2026, with all the licensing changes and everything around that?
Ryan:
You can always go to the help menu and the product and go to about. And of course, that will tell you the current version that you're using, but it also tell you the status of your SMA or if you have a subscription, so you can always do that. Or you can always contact your local dealer, or you can contact our customer support, and they'll help you know which version you're authorized for, and they can help you get updated if that needs to happen. You can also call our main number, if you call in the US, 1-800-444-4443. And you can talk to our team there and they'll make sure to get you the right information if you're not current and how to get current as well.
OLEG:
So Ryan Jones, Senior Vice President, Global Accessibility Strategy and Advocacy. Thanks for sharing, and thanks for all the great work you're doing.
Ryan:
Thank you Oleg, and I look forward to talking with you all again sometime down the road.
So as Ryan has already mentioned, if you're in the United States and you're installing JAWS, ZoomText, or Fusion 2026, either as a new installation or an upgrade, then you will most likely be invited to sign in or create a user account. Actually, you may already have a user account if you have previously registered on our Freedom Scientific portal where you get your license. So you can easily use your portal credentials to log in. But what if you don't have that? The account creation and sign-in process is quick, easy, and accessible. Here is Elizabeth Whitaker to demonstrate how it works.
Elizabeth Whitaker:
Now let's walk through creating an account and signing in right from the JAWS software. After installing JAWS 2026, the first time it runs, you will encounter this sign-in screen. JAWS says:
Sign in to your account. You must sign in with a Vispero account to use JAWS. JAWS will run for 59 minutes to give you time to complete the step.
So you'll have an hour to sign in initially, and then you'll be able to request more time after that, and you'll have a couple more options. But let's go ahead and navigate this dialog and get signed in right away so we can start using the software. Now while we are doing this though, during this hour, we will still have full functionality here with JAWS.
So I'm going to press the tab key to navigate through this dialog, and I immediately land on the “Sign in with Google” button. If I continue tabbing, I get to enter my email address and password, and that’s yet another way to sign in. And of course, there is the “Forgot Password” button, should I need to use one. Finally, there is a “Create account” button, in case you need to set up a new account.
But for now, let’s press the “Sign in with Google” button. After doing so, we are notified that a sign-in page has been opened in our default browser. This is the standard Google page which allows you to sign into a 3rd-party service with your Google account. I have a few existing Google accounts, so I could select one of those to be used for this sign-in. I would be prompted to enter a password, and then it would take me on to the next step.
However, for the purposes of this demo, I'm going to press Alt+F4, because we're not actually going to sign in that way. Instead, we will get back to our original sign-in page, and we’ll activate the button to create a new Vispero account.
This takes us to portal.vispero.com, and this is where we can create our new account.
On this page, we are presented with a very simple form for us to fill out. And the first piece of information it's asking here is my date of birth. So I'm going to press enter on the field labeled “Birth Month”, From here, I can do one of two things. I can either type the month that I would like to select by typing the two digits for the month, or I can keep pressing DOWNARROW until
I get to the month I want to select.
From here I can press the TAB key to navigate to the Birth Year field. Now I can either use my arrow keys to choose a birth year, or I can type in the year. I could also press DELETE to clear the field before typing anything in.
After entering my birth year, I press TAB to move to the SUBMIT button. Pressing that button will submit my entry, and the new page will open, prompting me to enter my email address. I will do so, and then press the “Continue” button.
Now, on the next page, I am told that an email has been sent to the address I’ve just entered, with a link that can be used to finish setting up my account. So I press ALT+TAB to switch to my email client to retrieve the confirmation request message, which is now in my Inbox. The message contains the “Verify My Email” link. I press enter on that, and the link takes me back over to the Vispero portal.
Here, I fill out my basic registration data. The form is asking for my first and last name, as well as prompting me to set and confirm my password. I fill out these fields and press the “Continue” button.
So now I get another form that's asking me for a few more pieces of information. The first field allows me to pick my country. United States is selected by default because right now this feature is only available in the United States.
The next field is for my phone number. I can simply type the 3-digit area code, followed by the 7-digit number.
Next is the combo box labeled: “What best describes your product use?” The choices are: Home, school, work. I can navigate between the choices with arrow keys, and I press ENTER to select.
The next press of the TAB key moves me to a series of checkboxes, and I am asked to select all that apply. These checkboxes describe my intended use of the product. There is also an option labeled “Other”, allowing me to add something that’s not mentioned here.
The next combo box allows me to specify if I purchased the product. The choices are “Yes” or “No”.
Next is the checkbox to join the Vispero mailing list about product updates, and I am going to keep that checked, because I do want to be informed about product updates.
Finally, there is the button labeled “Create account”. I press ENTER on that, and it gets me to the “Registration Complete” page. I am told that I may now use my account to sign in to JAWS.
So we've created the account. Now we need to sign in. I'm going to go ahead and press ALT+F4 to get out of that portal window. And I'm going to ALT+TAB over here to my account sign-in.
Now, I can enter my email address and password into the sign-in form. And I will press enter on the sign-in with email button. At this point, I get the page that says: “Sign-in complete. You may close this window and continue using JAWS”.
All right, so I’ve signed in, and I can close this window, and I can continue using JAWS.
So that is how you create a Vispero account and sign-in. And you will only have to do this once. You won't have to do it every time you run JAWS, you'll already be signed in.
Throughout this year, we've been celebrating the 30th anniversary of JAWS for Windows. You remember that when Ted Henter had a business idea, he was joined by his friend and partner, Bill Joyce, to make that idea a reality. That was many, many years ago. But what if you have a wonderful business idea now? Where do you go for guidance and potential partnership? To talk about this, we're joined here in our virtual studio by Colleen Wunderlich of the Chicago Lighthouse. Hello Colleen, and welcome to FSCast.
COLLEEN WUNDERLICH:
Thank you so much for including me in this episode. I'm so glad to be here with you.
OLEG:
And you serve as one of the vice presidents at the Chicago Lighthouse. What are your responsibilities?
COLLEEN:
I'm vice president of partnerships, and my main responsibility is overseeing the Forsythe Entrepreneurial Center, but I also work with other partnerships to further the agency's mission. We are an agency of over 40 programs. We serve people who are blind or visually impaired and people who have disabilities and veterans. And we have programs that range from birth to senior citizen age. So we have a birth to three program. We have a full low vision clinic and assistive devices store, we have employment programs and a seniors program. We have programs for veterans, just a wide range of social service programs. And within that is the Forsythe Entrepreneurial Center. And we help people start businesses. We do specifically focus on individuals who are blind or visually impaired. And we certainly would serve veterans or people with other disabilities, but we were founded to address the underemployment problem that our population specifically faces.
OLEG:
So when you mentioned people you're serving, is that limited to the Chicago area, or is it broader than that?
COLLEEN:
The Forsythe Entrepreneurial Center is national. Our business competition that I know that we're going to be speaking about is for US residents only, and that is a limitation that is set forth by our funders. But we certainly have all of our programs online, so they can be accessed by people all over the world.
OLEG:
I must disclose something here. 10 years ago, exactly 10 years ago now, I had a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to visit the Chicago Lighthouse and I saw one assistive technology device, which I purchased literally within the next two weeks after seeing that at the Lighthouse. And that was quite an expensive device. But after trying it out I saw this is exactly what I need. And Lighthouse gave me that opportunity. Is that part of your mission to make devices and technologies available to people and to show the possibilities? Or is it something that happened to me by accident?
COLLEEN:
No, it's no accident. We have an assistive devices store, and we also have an online store called My Tools for Living, where you can purchase technology. We offer within our store training on the devices as well. So we still have that program alive and well. And I'm glad to hear that you've actually visited us and you were able to benefit from that.
OLEG:
Absolutely. And I would recommend that to other FSCast listeners. But today we're talking about starting one's own business. Where does the lighthouse come into this right now?
COLLEEN:
Well, we moved the program to the Chicago Lighthouse in July 2022, because we felt it was a better fit with the employment programs that the Chicago Lighthouse offers. It was formally started at Hadley in 2011, and as Hadley's mission changed to serve older adults losing their vision, it was thought that the Forsythe Center would thrive in an agency that focused on employment. So we've been here since July 2022. And we have restored full operation of the program pretty much right away after coming here. But the final piece of the program that we had yet to bring back was the business competition.
So many of our students have been asking for it, and we have finally been able to secure the funding through the generous contribution of Sandy Forsythe, who is a trustee at the Chicago Lighthouse and also at Hadley. We've been able to bring back this competition that has been asked for for as long as I've been over here. The last one that we held was in September of 2021, so it's been four years and we've redesigned it and relaunched it for the first time here at the Chicago Lighthouse, and we're excited to be able to offer it on a national level.
OLEG:
Can you talk to me about some of the former winners of the competition? Are there any business initiatives that have grown out of that?
COLLEEN:
Yes, we've run the competition five times previously and we've awarded over $150,000 to nine entrepreneurs. If you visit Forage Candle, she was a winner of the competition and has a business where she makes candles from skincare ingredients and wild botanicals. And they are ingredients that can be applied to the skin. And she won our competition in 2018. We also have someone called Thrive Practice in Iowa City. The gentleman is a psychotherapist and wanted to open his own practice, and so he used the award money to build out his office space and to be able to offer benefits to the other therapists and wellness professionals that he hired to be in his clinic. We also have, in the very beginning, awarded someone in an aquaponics business. We have someone that we awarded had a business called Ivory Beauty, and she is distributing products for people with albinism and people with light complexion, cosmetic products, eyelashes, things of that nature. She was a winner. And we have another gentleman that has a fishing and tackle business that he sells on Amazon. Those are some of the businesses that we have awarded.
OLEG:
Well, that's really quite a broad range. So what kind of people are you looking for this year?
COLLEEN:
Well, we're looking for people who are blind or visually impaired. That is a requirement to apply for the competition. You have to be over 18 years of age, and a legal resident of the US and the business has to reside within the US. We're really looking to someone who is launch-ready, meaning that the award that we're giving, which is a $25,000 award, would enable you to start your business right away. So maybe you have the business, you need some capital, you need some equipment, maybe you even have started the business and you have it a product concept or you have a service that you're offering, but you need the money for equipment or any expenses that you have to take your business to the next level. That's definitely the type of candidate that we're looking for. So it is, I would say, more for micro-entrepreneurship, but we have had both.
We've had people who have started their business really from scratch, and we've had some people who have the business in the very beginning stages, meaning that they're in the first year, very early growth phase and they need some more capital to grow their business or take it to the next level. The award will go to the person who has the most viable venture. So we definitely want it to be a business that can grow and can be sustainable in the way that it's structured and everything from its funding to its management. The person who is blind has to be a majority owner, meaning they have to have more than 51% of the business and have to have an operational role in the business and be involved in it. So that's pretty much what we're looking for.
What is different about this year is, we have partnered with Miami University of Ohio.
Miami University of Ohio School of Commerce has designed a special business plan development non-credit course. It is where someone who applies to the competition can work one-on-one with an entrepreneurship professor who actually is a CPA and he is an entrepreneur, so he's a practitioner as well as a professor. They can work one-on-one with a professor to develop a formal business plan. We're offering six scholarships for this opportunity. And so phase one is getting accepted into the scholarship program, and we'll be accepting six candidates. And then the second phase is when the business plans are completed, they go to a panel of judges who will pick the most viable new venture winner.
OLEG:
So you actually help six candidates to prepare their business plan before that business plan reaches the panel. The candidate will have worked through the business plan with a specialist. Is that correct?
COLLEEN:
That's correct. They'll have spent three months one-on-one with a professor developing this plan. So the spirit of the competition is twofold and it always has been. It's to help someone get their product or service idea formed into a business. So you need a formal business plan for that, whether you're borrowing money, whether you are presenting to investors or just for yourself as the business owner, you need a business plan to keep you on track with your strategy and your overall business operation. The spirit of the competition is that you're supposed to learn something and get the award. That's of course the best case scenario, right? But if you don't win, you still come away with a business plan. And I mentioned earlier, Bronco Fishing and Tackle, they had applied to the competition prior and had pulled out of the competition and developed their business plan and came back and reapplied. So if people come away with a business plan and they don't win, they can take that plan and seek other funding or perhaps reapply in the future. So we want you to come away with something.
OLEG:
Is the competition also open to prior years' participants?
COLLEEN:
Sure. They will have to develop a business plan under the university's auspices, but it is open to prior participants. There is another component to the contest as well, is that you have to have verified that you have a visual impairment by a letter from a rehabilitation agency, or a rehabilitation professional, or eye care specialist. So you have to have a visual impairment. And we are also in partnership with World Services for the Blind who's going to help us with technology and skills assessments online because once you get to the university, there really isn't help with technical support or any online navigation.
So we want to make sure that people can be successful in that learning experience. So whether or not they're a former participant, all applicants will have to go through that process because when we run a contest, we have to keep everything equal for all of our applicants. I bring that forward because someone might think, well, I've applied before, so they know I have visual impairment and they know I have skills. But we'll ask you to go through the entire application process. But definitely, if you've applied before and you haven't won, we definitely encourage you to apply with us.
OLEG:
So Colleen, for the purposes of this competition, what is meant by a visual impairment?
COLLEEN:
It would be anyone who has documented legal blindness.
OLEG:
Okay. And if we have a family and one of the partners is blind, the other is sighted, and we're talking about a family business, that would also be welcome for potential submission. Is that correct?
COLLEEN:
Yes, it would. As a matter of fact, in my experience working with entrepreneurs, the ones who are the most successful often have a partner, whether it's a spouse or even a business partner, a co-founder. I would say, that's the case for someone who's a business owner, whether or not they're blind or visually impaired, that doesn't matter. I just think when someone has a partner or co-founder, they have much more support. And in my experience, often achieve greater success because of that. So I certainly would encourage a family business as long as the person who is blind or visually impaired is the primary owner and has a very active management role within the business.
OLEG:
If I already have some potential investors and I'm looking for some additional seed money for my business, is it still worth applying?
COLLEEN:
Absolutely. It is worth applying because we are looking for your business to be launch-ready, and if that means that you have other funding sources, that will only strengthen your application. I'm not saying that that is a requirement, it certainly isn't. We've awarded people in both situations, people with no startup capital and people with some significant startup capital. You will have to really demonstrate in your business plan how you will use the award money. And if you have additional startup funds, that's fabulous because that will only contribute to your ability to launch the business. So that's fine.
OLEG:
And finally, how about a person who's never had an experience running their own business versus somebody who has had two or three businesses before? Does one of them have an advantage in your eyes, in your application?
COLLEEN:
I think people who have owned businesses before have learned from their mistakes and probably have a greater chance of success, but I've also seen people who have never run a business before win this competition and succeed. So I wouldn't say that it gives them a further advantage as it relates to the competition. I think it would give them a further advantage as it relates to running a business. But really, we're looking for someone who has demonstrated experience in the product or service area where they're developing the business. So perhaps they've never run a business, but they have industry experience, they have product development experience, they have a network. I think the people who I've seen being the most successful have any combination of those attributes. They have industry experience, they have a network of people upon which they can draw to create a customer base or to form their own professional advisory team, if you will, to help them run their business.
So we're definitely looking for someone who has experience in one of those areas. I would definitely encourage someone who's out there who's never worked, that they want to start a business to look for some employment in that area to gain some experience before going and trying to start a business because I think there are certain aspects of working that you can only learn through working, having been employed, that I think are very useful in running one's business.
OLEG:
So Colleen, where do I go to get more information, to get more questions answered or to actually file an application?
COLLEEN:
You would go to Forsythe Entrepreneurial Center,. And you'll find the button there that you can click to apply. There is a form that has to be filled out and some forms that you have to submit. The deadline is November 24th, so that's in the United States, the Monday before the Thanksgiving. It's Monday of Thanksgiving week. So Monday before Thanksgiving holiday is the deadline.
OLEG:
And for the students or former students among us, there ain't no deadline extension, right?
COLLEEN:
At this point, there is not. So if you're interested, I would say, definitely get on it right away.
OLEG:
And I do hope some of our FSCast listeners will apply and I do hope that your winner will be an FSCast listener. And by the way, if that happens to be you, so when you win, please let us know that you heard about this first on FSCast. Colleen Wunderlich, thank you so much for being with us and letting us know about this initiative.
COLLEEN:
Thank you so much for including me. And yes, part of the reason I came on here is I'm confident that someone who listens to this podcast will apply.
So that was Colleen Wunderlich. And now we're joined again by Elizabeth Whitaker to talk about the training opportunities in the month of November. Hello, Elizabeth, and great to hear you again.
ELIZABETH WHITAKER:
Hi Oleg. It's great to be here to talk about training. We have a lot coming up in November, actually.
OLEG:
Now your demo of the new account and registration experience was a bit brief. Anything you can advise those of us who would like more information before we dive into this?
ELIZABETH:
Absolutely. So we actually put out a couple of training events or training demos on this. We recorded that one that was actually featured on a video. And then we had our training podcast, the Freedom Scientific Training podcast, where we broke it out into a longer demo and also talked about another couple of features as well. But here in November on the 4th, which is a Tuesday, November 4th at noon Eastern, we are going to host a webinar where we're really going to talk about this account registration, all the great benefits that you're going to receive when you do create an account. And also walk you through that process extensively. So that's going to happen on Tuesday, November 4th.
OLEG:
Do I need to register for that, or how does it work?
ELIZABETH:
Yes. So you'll go to freedomscientific.com/training. Look for that heading that says upcoming webinars. And that will be the first webinar that you can register for on that page.
OLEG:
And then the next AI webinar.
ELIZABETH:
Yes. So the very next AI webinar, this is our training series that we have the first Thursday of every month, and so on Thursday, November 6th at noon Eastern. This time we are going to talk about Gemini. We're going to be using Gemini on the web and tell you how to navigate it and give you some tasks that you can practice using JAWS, ZoomText, and Fusion.
OLEG:
And once again, that's Thursday, November 6th. And to register for that one, you go to freedomscientific.com/learnai, right?
ELIZABETH:
Yes. You certainly can. You can go to our upcoming webinars page as well, but if you go to freedomscientific.com/learnai, you'll have access to all the previous webinars, the exercises, the resources, and so forth. So I recommend checking out that page.
OLEG:
And how about the software webinar for November?
ELIZABETH:
So we've moved that up a week because we wanted to tell you all about the new features and really talk about that earlier. So that is going to take place on Thursday, November 13th at noon Eastern. We're going to talk about what's new in JAWS, ZoomText, and Fusion, and you're going to get to see some of those features in action.
OLEG:
So once again, something to look forward to in our training department. And that brings us to the end of this episode of FSCast for October 2025. If you have any training related questions, write to training@vispero.com. And for FSCast related questions, write to fscast@vispero.com. Elizabeth, thank you for doing actually the funnest part of FSCast, which is always the last part. That's really, really cool to be doing that together.
ELIZABETH:
Yes, absolutely. Thank you.
OLEG:
And for everybody else, enjoy the month of November and see you soon. Bye.
ELIZABETH:
Bye.