Post on 08-Apr-2018
8/7/2019 Experiential Entrepreneurship Education for Engineering Students
1/18
ExperientialEntrepreneurship
Education forEngineering StudentsNick Such | Director of Labs |
nicksuch@gmail.com | @aerosuch
UK STEM Symposium 2011
8/7/2019 Experiential Entrepreneurship Education for Engineering Students
2/18
Who am I?
Grew up in the Midwest (Omaha, NE)
Moved to KY at 16 (South Oldham HS)
Mechanical Engineering at UK (2009) Solar Car, Tau Beta Pi, E-Club
GE, Toyota, Budapest
KSTC internship
Founded Awesome Labs in 2009 Stanford MBA in September
8/7/2019 Experiential Entrepreneurship Education for Engineering Students
3/18
What we do
Take risks
Promote role models
Build support system
8/7/2019 Experiential Entrepreneurship Education for Engineering Students
4/18
8/7/2019 Experiential Entrepreneurship Education for Engineering Students
5/18
What we actually do
Identify market opportunities
Propose relevant projects to senior designteams
Mentor student teams
3-month program, meet weekly
Incubate high-potential companies
Space, funding, leadership, network
8/7/2019 Experiential Entrepreneurship Education for Engineering Students
6/18
Example: AwesomeTouch
8/7/2019 Experiential Entrepreneurship Education for Engineering Students
7/18
Timeline: AwesomeTouch
Summer 2009: learned about NUI Group via UK VisCenter
Fall 2009: submitted project proposals to UK EE & CS
January 2010: started mentoring 1 EE, 2 CS teams
April 2010: Business students & EE team place 2nd at IdeaStateU
May 2010: Demo for Lexington CVB June 2010: Form AwesomeTouch, apply for KSTC funding
July 2010: Win $1k from KHIC BIG Idea
October 2010: Install first screens at CVB, LexArts during WEG
November 2010: Awarded $30k from KEF December 2010: Pitch at VatorSplash NYC
January 2011: Win $5k from KHIC BIG Idea
March 2011: Sell 3rd screen to Lexington Hilton
8/7/2019 Experiential Entrepreneurship Education for Engineering Students
8/18
8/7/2019 Experiential Entrepreneurship Education for Engineering Students
9/18
8/7/2019 Experiential Entrepreneurship Education for Engineering Students
10/18
Goals
Take risks
Small downsides, huge upsides
Build awareness of role models At least 6 buildings on UKs campus are
named after engineers entrepreneurs
Build support structure
Entrepreneurship is really hard
8/7/2019 Experiential Entrepreneurship Education for Engineering Students
11/18
Influencers
Steve Blank
Customer development
Eric Ries
Lean startups
Alex Osterwalder
Business Model Generation
8/7/2019 Experiential Entrepreneurship Education for Engineering Students
12/18
THE NEWS
8/7/2019 Experiential Entrepreneurship Education for Engineering Students
13/18
were mostly talking about
SOFTWARE
8/7/2019 Experiential Entrepreneurship Education for Engineering Students
14/18
Start with software
ElonMu
skismyhero
Then move onto the moredifficult engineeringchallenges
8/7/2019 Experiential Entrepreneurship Education for Engineering Students
15/18
Similar programs
NC State EEP SV trip, professors w/ startup
experience
http://www.engr.ncsu.edu/eep/ Stanford BASES
Competitions, ETL speakers
http://bases.stanford.edu/
Seed-stage accelerators YCombinator & TechStars
Funding, focus and mentorship
http://www.engr.ncsu.edu/eep/http://bases.stanford.edu/http://bases.stanford.edu/http://www.engr.ncsu.edu/eep/8/7/2019 Experiential Entrepreneurship Education for Engineering Students
16/18
Lessons Learned
Startups are really hard
You cant teach entrepreneurship; it must beexperienced
Culture matters Ideas dont
Failure is good
Engineers can make a great career out ofstarting companies
KY needs more tech entrepreneurs
8/7/2019 Experiential Entrepreneurship Education for Engineering Students
17/18
Resources in Lexington
Awesome Inc Startup Weekend StartupDigest MobileX Conference
In2Lex Startup Advantage April Is
5 Across & Venture Club UK E-Club & Wildcat Investors Bluegrass Angels ICC & Von Allmen center KSTC & KHIC
8/7/2019 Experiential Entrepreneurship Education for Engineering Students
18/18
Terminology
Advisor or Mentor Someone with valuable skills or experience who help s startup founders, often without compensation
Angel Investors High-net worth individuals who invest personal money in startups. See gamblers.
Business Plan A lengthy document that is often wrong by the time it is completed. Requested by some investors.
Bootstrapping startup Running off founder money, or customer money (not external investment)
Co-founders People who start a company together
Funded startup Running with angel or VC money. Typically involves trading an equity stake
Mature company A startup that has achieved PMF and has a repeatable business model
Product-Market fit The stage at which a startup begins to transition from experimentation to execution
Project
A defined course of action that a group decides to pursue Revenue
Customer funding, the only sustainable (and most sexy) type
Startup A company that has not yet found product-market fit
Venture Capitalists Institutional investors (someone elses money)