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Technology Entrepreneurship: How to Start a New Venture

Find out how to recognise, develop and exploit entrepreneurial opportunities. Start your own entrepreneurial venture.

4,907 enrolled on this course

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  • Duration

    3 weeks
  • Weekly study

    3 hours

What does it mean to be entrepreneurial?

Being entrepreneurial is an exciting challenge and will help make your technology-based idea a reality.

In this free online course, you’ll learn from experienced technology entrepreneurs and educators from the University of Twente how to address three crucial questions along the path towards a financially sustainable venture. You’ll find out how to recognise, evaluate and exploit entrepreneurial opportunities.

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Skip to 0 minutes and 7 seconds Do you want to become the next successful technology entrepreneur? Welcome to the University of Twente, the most entrepreneurial university of the Netherlands. The University of Twente is home to technology entrepreneurs who profit from the vibrant ecosystem. Here at the Gallery, many successful tech ventures are located. They profit from hands-on support from Novel-T, our transfer office, and from the vibrant interactions with of students and university staff from NIKOS, the Netherlands Institute of Knowledge Intensive Entrepreneurship. Companies located here, such as Scisports, Lionix, Eye on Air, and others have a strong technology base. Here in DesignLab, students are experimenting with business ideas and prototypes to become the next generation of successful entrepreneurs.

Skip to 0 minutes and 52 seconds Being entrepreneurial is an exciting challenge, a path to real impact with new ideas, Technology. Yet, how to realise this ambition. The basic steps of realising this ambition are organised in the entrepreneurial process. We need to recognise the opportunity. We then need to develop the venture in a market-oriented way. Finally, we need to expploit your opportunity through networks and realise a financially sustainable business. There are some important questions along the entrepreneurial process. What is the opportunity? Who is your customer? How can you use your network? To answer these questions, you can use the toolbox of the lean startup method.

Skip to 1 minute and 34 seconds This online course is of interest to you if you want to play an active part of an entrepreneurial ecosystem– for example, by creating your own technology-oriented venture, or by engaging in consulting and support. In three weeks’ time, you will learn about key steps of the entrepreneurial process and the lean startup method. You get to profit from the experience of NIKOS staff with combined decades of experience and technology entrepreneurship. Also, Twente technology entrepreneurs will share their journey in entrepreneurship with you. Embark on your entrepreneurial journey with us, and get started with this online course.

Syllabus

  • Week 1

    Opportunity recognition

    • About this online course

      During the next 3 weeks you will be introduced to the topic of entrepreneurship. Here we inform you how the team can help you with getting the most out of this course.

    • What is entrepreneurship?

      Learn about types of opportunities and the entrepreneurial process with successful University of Twente entrepreneurs.

    • What is Lean Startup?

      The Lean Startup method is a toolset that helps you to start your venture in a structured way. To use it effectively, you need to know its principles and where it comes from.

    • How to recognize opportunities

      How will you recognize an opportunity? And what exactly is an opportunity? The entrepreneurial process begins with an idea that can turn into an opportunity. Is any idea an opportunity?

    • How to evaluate opportunities

      When there are multiple opportunities, which one will you exploit? For making a good decision you have to evaluate the opportunities. But how to do it?

    • Week review

      Has your view on entrepreneurship changed?

  • Week 2

    Opportunity development

    • This week

      We will introduce and explain the concepts of market segmentation, customer research, identifying target markets, value proposition, and prototyping including how to successfully apply the concepts

    • On customer value driven market segmentation

      The reason why many businesses fail is because they started to operate in a market too broadly defined. Therefore, it is important to think about market segments in an early stage.

    • Customer research in the lean startup

      Do you understand the needs of your user? If you do, you can create a product or service that will generate value for them and for you.

    • Targeting and positioning

      Based on a clear overview of possible market segments, now it is time to focus on targeting and positioning, an important step for any start-up to become successful in the marketplace.

    • Does your product fit the market?

      Rarely, entrepreneurs get the product right the first time. A good approach to get it right is – at an early stage and with low costs – to test whether the users would actually adopt your solution.

    • Week in review

      Week summary needs to be added here.

  • Week 3

    Opportunity exploitation

    • From idea to implementation

      Focus on all the resources you need to get your business running.

    • Identifying your network

      Your independent mindset makes you believe that you have to recognize, develop and exploit opportunities by yourself. Yet you do not need to be a super hero.

    • Network management

      It is time to evaluate your business network. This can help to make effective and efficient use of your partners.

    • What about business models and financing?

      Does this business idea have a financially sound foundation? Realizing the idea takes a step by step process of investments into a profitable and sustainable business.

    • Wrap up

      Short wrap-up of the week and this course.

When would you like to start?

  • Date to be announced

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Learning on this course

On every step of the course you can meet other learners, share your ideas and join in with active discussions in the comments.

What will you achieve?

By the end of the course, you‘ll be able to...

  • Develop a technology-based business model from a basic idea towards a financially sustainable business
  • Apply the principles of Lean Startup as a tool for new venture development
  • Recognise the importance of being marketing-oriented and the effects of networks on new venture development
  • Use tools for revenue analysis of a new venture

Who is the course for?

This course is for entry-level students from all disciplines with an interest in technology-based entrepreneurship. It will be of particular interest to STEM students.

Who will you learn with?

Associate Professor for Entrepreneurship at NIKOS, University Twente, The Netherlands

Who developed the course?

University of Twente

As a young and entrepreneurial university in the Netherlands, the University of Twente prepares young people to tackle the grand challenges the world will be facing during the coming decades.

Learning on FutureLearn

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  • Complete 90% of course steps and all of the assessments to earn your certificate

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