Winter School: Innovation & Start-up

• Students from all departments are invited to participate
• Participants interested in starting an own company or bringing to market an new idea/technology

• The innovation process and its sources
• The business network sourrounding product development
• Entrepreneurship as starting up new businesses
• New-technology based firms
• Planning a start-up
• Responsible entrepreneurship

Business success and competitive advantage are increasingly based on innovation, rather than merely price competition and cost efficiency. Innovating includes also identifying, creating and seizing new commercial opportunities, especially through the creation of start-ups and new ventures. Therefore, managers at all levels and entrepreneurs need to understand the dynamics and mechanisms of innovation.

This includes being able to handle the following issues: Where do innovative ideas comes from? Wow can they be transformed into successful products launched on the market? Which barriers and opportunities emerge during the innovation process? Wow can the creativity, uncertainty and risk in this process be managed? Wow can start-ups and innovations be developed in a socially responsible and sustainable way?

The course addresses the issues above in both theory and practice. The relevant models and concepts are first introduced by the teacher and then applied by students to a series of practical cases, discussed either in pair or by the whole class. Participants will also train in developing and defending their own start-up ideas in front of panel of peers during an “entrepreneur-venture capitalist” roleplay. To successfully complete the course, participants will have to prepare, analyse and deliver to the teacher an own case of innovation or start-up process.