Study Entrepreneurship and Innovation at WashU Olin

Learn by Doing

• IdeaBounce® Competition

  Olin’s BIG IdeaBounce® is a 2-minute-video elevator pitch contest open to all WashU students. The $15,000 prize purse helps winners get their big ideas off the ground. All ideas receive personalized feedback from a panel of experienced judges and mentors.

  The WashU Olin Big IdeaBounce® Powered by Poets & Quants is a pitch competition to support and encourage the entrepreneurial spirit and the creation of innovative solutions. This exciting competition is open to student startups around the world. Teams compete for a $50,000 grand prize to fund their idea. In last year’s competition, we received 158 submissions from teams representing 90+ schools and 13 countries.

• The Hatchery

  Teams of students work with local entrepreneurs and investors to develop a business plan and then present their recommendations to startup and venture capital experts. The Hatchery is the oldest university-affiliated business-plan course in the country.

• The League of Extraordinary Entrepreneurs

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  The “League” is an advanced entrepreneurship class that functions like an accelerator for WashU student entrepreneurs with business ideas. You can join as an individual or with a team. It’s a great opportunity to work with some of WashU’s most successful alumni and friends.

  In the past, we featured Jim McKelvey (Square), Andrew Rubin (Illumio), Jesse Pujji (Gateway X), David Eckstein (Menlo Security), Lori Coulter (Summersalt), JD Ross (Opendoor & Royal.io), Lee Fixel (Addition), Deborah Barta (BlockFi), Marc Bernstein (Balto), Chuck Cohn (Nerdy), Luke Saunders (Farmer’s Fridge), Amie Patel (Elevar Equity), Maxine Clark (Build-A-Bear) and Eliana Eskinazi (Wagr).

  Learn more about the League.

• Startup Consulting

  Student consultants engage in semester-long consulting projects for startups at various stages of their development through the Center for Experiential Learning. Two courses—CELect and Metrics Clinic—leverage WashU’s relationships with the St. Louis startup community, providing a one-of-a-kind opportunity for students who want to run existing companies or launch their own firms. CELect students have worked with startups in St. Louis, New York, San Francisco, Austin, Israel and more.

• Holekamp Seed Fund

  This seed fund provides $1,000 awards and up to $5,000 follow-on rewards to WashU student entrepreneurs to defray the initial costs of founding a business.

  Read more about the fund.

• Run a Campus Business

  Through WashU’s Student Enterprise Program (StEP), you can create a campus business or buy an existing one—and manage it until you graduate. The success of the business is reliant on you, and the university allocates and subsidizes storefront locations.

• Skandalaris Center

  Extracurricular entrepreneurship activities are offered by WashU’s Skandalaris Center for Interdisciplinary Innovation and Entrepreneurial Studies, which sponsors business plan competitions, speakers, internships, mentoring programs and more.

• Arch Grants

  WashU students and faculty are frequent participants in the Arch Grants business plan competition, which provides $75,000 grants to startups and takes no equity in return.

• St. Louis Ecosystem

  The entrepreneurial ecosystem around St. Louis is considerable. And it provides access and opportunity to WashU students. Olin’s classroom extends beyond campus to St. Louis’s thriving innovation district, which includes Cortex Innovation Community, a vibrant, 200-acre hub of business, innovation and technology, and downtown’s T-REX, a nonprofit technology startup incubator.