Entrepreneurship (ENTR)

ENTR 204 (s) Special Topics (1-16 credits)

Credit arranged

ENTR 298 (s) Internship (1-3 credits, max 6)

ENTR 299 (s) Directed Study (1-16 credits)

Credit arranged

ENTR 314 Startup Innovation and Ideation (1 credit)

In this course, students develop the skillset needed for the early stages of entrepreneurship by developing a common language and understanding of the process of identifying startup ideas that have real potential to enter the marketplace. Additional topics may include: an introduction to innovation, design thinking, and the process for ideation techniques to yield stronger product and service prospects. Through a combination of activities and experiential deep dives with mentors and experts, students will learn how to come up with, evaluate, and test innovations and ideas. Typically Offered: Fall.

ENTR 315 Feasibility Analysis (1 credit)

This course focuses on new venture initiation and the preparation of a feasibility study that can be used to begin operations in a new business enterprise. It examines the critical factors involved in the conception, initiation, and development of new business ventures. Students will assess the viability of a business idea to determine if the concept is feasible for business startup, expansion, or long-term growth. The student will identify and analyze through basic research the present climate to determine current trends for their business idea by completing an industry, target market and competitive analysis. Typically Offered: Fall.

ENTR 316 Business Model Design (2 credits)

Learn what works does not in innovative startups and inspiring leading-edge organizations. ENTR 316 Business Model Design will offer an engaging mix of content, case studies, student investigations, and class guests who inspire ideas and insights. To frame the issues and opportunities, we will analyze varied organizations, ask why some fall short while others grow and contribute to the people they serve. An understanding of bottlenecks, constraints, and opportunities sets the context for ongoing exploration of promising business model and social enterprise innovations. How will you create and deliver value for your customers is the operative question we will begin with and then progress to how you will extract some of that value for your organization. Business model development is essential for startups which need to discover, defend, or pivot their business models. This course introduces a structured way to think about, analyze, and develop a sound business model. Typically Offered: Fall.

ENTR 317 (s) Intellectual Property and Legal Issues for New Ventures (1 credit)

This is a course in intellectual property (IP) and legal basics for entrepreneurs. It covers what, when, who, how, and why of IP: what kinds of information can be protected, when these rights arise, who owns them, how they are enforced, and why the legal system goes to all this trouble. Areas to be discussed include trade secret, patent, copyright, trademark, false advertising, right of publicity, and design patents, as well as basic legal issues. Typically Offered: Fall.

ENTR 318 Prototype Development (1 credit)

Students will work in teams to design and build working alpha prototypes of new products. Students learn about creativity, product design, teamwork, and working within a budget in a unifying startup experience. The course is designed to emulate what engineers might experience as part of a design team in a modern product development firm. The effort spans the early phases of product development, including opportunity identification, generating ideas, gathering customer and market data, selecting ideas, devising concepts and sketch models, building and testing mockups, customer evaluation of mockups, embodiment design, and construction of a high-quality functioning alpha prototype. Typically Offered: Spring.

ENTR 319 New Venture Marketing (1 credit)

The course is about the marketing challenges in an entrepreneurial firm. Entrepreneurship is the discovery and pursuit of new business opportunities. Successful execution of an entrepreneurial idea requires a sound marketing plan and a strategy for starting and growing a successful entrepreneurial venture. In this course, students from a variety of backgrounds understand how to develop and operationalize a marketing plan for new ventures. The skills and knowledge learned will investigate how marketing tools can enable potential entrepreneurs to realize the full potential of their ideas. Typically Offered: Spring.

ENTR 320 New Venture Funding (1 credit)

Entrepreneurship is the relentless pursuit of opportunity without regard to resources currently controlled. New Venture Funding is, then, the collection of financial skills necessary to execute this difficult yet critical aspect of startup. If one is to pursue opportunity without regard to resources currently controlled, it is necessary to be able to identify attractive business opportunities, to estimate the resources necessary to undertake these opportunities, to secure such resources on favorable terms, and to prudently manage them in pursuit of the opportunity. The goal of this course is to sharpen skills in all these activities. This class focuses on one of the most compelling issues for new/small/growing/private companies: how to raise capital and serves as an overview of all the options available to successfully finance new ventures including debt financing (from venture banks, commercial banks, and SBICs) and equity financing (from angel investors, private placements, venture capitalists, and public equity markets). The course should also appeal to individuals interested in general management careers in larger companies who believe that an entrepreneurial perspective is valuable in all walks of business life. Typically Offered: Spring.

ENTR 321 Accounting for Entrepreneurs (1 credit)

At the heart of every successful startup is a certain level of financial literacy needed by founders to guide and navigate the startup from simply an idea to launch and beyond. The goal of this course is to lay the foundation for what a founder needs to know to successfully launch and scale a startup from the accountant's’ perspective. Typically Offered: Spring.

ENTR 322 Social Ventures (1 credit)

Social enterprises are formed to solve societal problems like hunger, illiteracy, poverty, and lack of access to health care. Business and funding models for these businesses differ radically from traditional entrepreneurial ventures. This course will introduce students to the rapidly growing field of social entrepreneurship and innovation where they will examine wide variety of approaches to solving social problems that use tools traditionally employed in business. The emphasis is on innovation, raising capital in the context of social enterprise, and developing an entrepreneurial mindset. The course also will explore the challenges of quantifying social returns from so-called double bottom line investments. Typically Offered: Spring.

ENTR 323 Launching Tech Ventures (1 credit)

This course is designed for students who will start their own tech companies, those who will join early-stage startups vested in technology, or those who will seek career positions in growth stage technology firms. The course will take the perspective of founders struggling to find product-market fit in their early-stage startups. The course will have a tactical, implementation bias rather than a strategic one and will focus on finding fit in a tech venture and designing a business model for success and scaling. Typically Offered: Fall.

ENTR 398 (s) Internship (1-3 credits, max 6)

ENTR 404 (s) Special Topics (1-16 credits)

Credit arranged

ENTR 414 Entrepreneurship (3 credits)

This course is intended to provide an overview of the entrepreneurship phenomenon and the process of identifying and commercializing an opportunity. Primary emphasis will be placed on recognizing and creating an opportunity, feasibility analysis, elements of the business plan, and sources of start-up funds. As such, this class will provide the foundation for developing a business plan for a real entrepreneurial venture in subsequent semesters.

ENTR 415 New Venture Creation (3 credits)

The primary purposes of this course are to help diverse teams of students create business plans detailing the operational and financial aspects of a proposed product innovation, and where appropriate, prepare teams to compete in the VIEW-sponsored Business Plan Competition. In order to accomplish this, students will learn how to research and effectively communicate all aspects of a typical business plan, including, but not necessarily limited to: industry analysis, competitor analysis, target marketing, sales strategy, risk assessment, legal considerations, operational plan, management and staffing plan, financial plan and executive summary. The intention is to have the class be a practical-based "laboratory" much of the time, with occasional lectures, demonstrations, guest speakers, relevant videos, and student presentations throughout the term.

Prereqs: Senior standing or Permission

ENTR 499 (s) Directed Study (1-16 credits)

Credit arranged