Take an Idea from Imagination to Impact
Study Entrepreneurship and Innovation at WashU Olin
Advance yourself on the path to entrepreneurship with Olin.
Creative, forward-thinking students. Collaborative, hands-on learning. Opportunities to pitch ideas and win funding. St. Louis’s lively entrepreneurial ecosystem. These elements drive Olin’s focus on the entrepreneurial spirit. It’s a focus so fundamental to us that it’s one of our pillars of excellence.
Olin is dedicated to fostering innovation and supporting budding entrepreneurs. We teach you to fall in love with problems and envision solutions that change the way things are done, not to mention people’s lives. From classes to student consulting to competitions to extracurriculars, you have ample opportunity to develop the skills and background you need to see your entrepreneurial dreams realized.
Additionally, WashU Olin is part of the entrepreneurial ecosystem in St. Louis as well as Silicon Valley, New York City and Tel Aviv, to name a few.
Entrepreneurship by the Numbers
# 1 MBA
for entrepreneurship
Poets & Quants 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024
#8 undergrad
program for entrepreneurship
Princeton Review 2023
50+
entrepreneurship courses
available to students campus-wide
$735 million
in funding
for student- and alumni-founded startups since program began
Entrepreneurial Courses
Olin’s entrepreneurship courses are based on collaboration, cross-disciplinary thinking and hands-on learning. As a student, you choose courses that focus on your specific interests in entrepreneurship. Some of our entrepreneurial courses include:
Workshop Your Own Idea
The Hatchery
Introduction to Entrepreneurship
Social Entrepreneurship
The League of Extraordinary Entrepreneurs
Embed with a Startup
CELect: St Louis, San Francisco, New York City and international
Marketing Metrics
Consult with Investors
Venture Capital Methods and Practice
Private Equity Methods and Practice
Entrepreneurship through Acquisition
Innovate within Larger Entities
Managing the Innovation Process
Innovating for Defense
Change the World
Social Innovation
Endgame of Entrepreneurship: Leveraging Capitalism for Good
Learn by Doing
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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.
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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.
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The League of Extraordinary Entrepreneurs
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).
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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.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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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.
Olin’s MBA program gave me the confidence I needed to take entrepreneurial risks in the real world. The program’s rigorous coursework helped me develop a deep understanding of business strategy and prioritization.
—Kai Skallerud, MBA 2022
Fastest-Growing Startup City
St. Louis is one of only seven US cities ranked in PitchBook’s top 20 fastest-growing startup hubs in the world.
Venture capital firm PitchBook’s Global VC Ecosystems ranking looks at the most developed markets for venture capital activity and the cities seeing the fastest growth. Coming in at #20, St. Louis joins Dubai, Milan, Miami and other global cities “growing their VC activity at a faster rate than more established, expensive and saturated locations.”
Real-World Learning
Consult for a startup and gain real-world entrepreneurial experience working closely with founders and principals.
Center for Experiential LearningMajor in Entrepreneurship
For undergrads with a passion for innovation, our entrepreneurship major provides the spark to help you realize your lifelong career goals.
BSBA majors and minorsAn MBA Focused on Entrepreneurship
Gain the confidence, contacts and know-how to thrive in the startup community, whatever role you pursue, with the MBA Entrepreneurship concentration.
Full-Time MBA concentrationsDedicated to Students
Doug Villhard is Olin’s resident entrepreneurship guru. He’s a professor of practice in entrepreneurship and academic director for entrepreneurship. Doug’s a serial entrepreneur—starting, selling, buying, advising and investing in companies. He’s also a dedicated teacher who likes nothing better than watching students thrive.
Want to talk entrepreneurship at WashU Olin? Doug’s the guy to contact.
Doug Villhard
dvillhard@wustl.edu
Professor Doug Villhard has been a valued mentor and advisor. Doug has always given me realistic feedback on growth aspirations and plans for my startup, sharing his own experiences and best judgment on how to move forward. He has cultivated a great community of entrepreneurs at WashU, one that I draw insights from quite regularly.
—Paarvv Goel, MBA 2023