After completing this course students will know how to:

• ...search, recognize and assess business opportunities
• ...enrich business ideas by applying appropriate methods and tools
• ...identify customers and their needs
• ...analyze and evaluate the ecosystem around the business idea
• ...develop profitable and sustainable business models
• ...apply creativity techniques throughout the whole process of business development.

Furthermore, students will acquire relevant complementary skills:

Project Management:

• manage several different stakeholders at once
• structure an innovative, fuzzy project and deal with uncertainty 
• manage different ways to arrive at a decision
• summarizing the most important outcomes in a pitch-book 

Team Work:  

• work efficiently in interdisciplinary teams through recognizing and incorporating individual strengths of each team member
• cope with different work styles, opinions and perspectives
• complementing the team by actively searching for external support to outweigh weaknesses within the core team

Communication:

• engage in lively discussions and interactive workshops
• structure complex data (project outcomes)
• present project outcomes in different environments and for different target groups (e.g., experts, team members)

The course is built around several coaching sessions and workshops, which are structured to be interactive and combine several teaching methods, eg. teamwork, open discussions, individual team coaching, and coaching by external mentors.

During the kick-off session, the basic principles of entrepreneurship, business model design, opportunity recognition and tools to be employed during the semester will be presented and discussed.  

The students will be supported in the further development of their ideas by lecturers and external mentors. Regular presentations of results are scheduled. The results of the start-up planning process will be summarized in a pitch book.

To participate in the class "Business Project - Starting Up (Deep Tech Edition)", you need to register via LPIS until February 9, 2024. In addition, you'll have to submit an "application one pager" to peter.keinz@wu.ac.at in which you answer the following questions:

1.) Why do you want to participate in this class?

2.) What specific and relevant skills do you have that make you the "perfect" participant for this class?

Please submit your "application one pager" until February 09, 2024, 6 pm, at the latest.

Based on the "application one pager", the lecturer will make the final decision whether or not you'll be allowed to participate.