StartUp PhD
About this good practice
StartUp PhD was funded by Alentejo2020 with 191.464,18€ with the objective of putting to use and not let the best and most valuable concepts and ideas that originate out of the research work of the University of Évora’s PhD students — especially those working in scientific fields — while they are working on their PhD theses, be wasted.
The ultimate objective of StartUp PhD is to facilitate the existence of more start-ups (a company founded by an entrepreneur to develop a scalable business model) and spin-offs (a company founded on the findings of a member or members of a research group at a university), and to leverage them.
PhD students can be an important source of technology transfer not only for their enthusiasm, but also because they are working at the frontier of knowledge.
The course consists of 78 hours of onsite classes and was credited 3 ECTS according to the overall PhD program. The course is structured as a total of 4 classes during the semester: A motivational one, which aims to explain entrepreneurship’s benefits and present to the students international experiences of start-ups and spin-offs. An operational one, which aims to empower the students with practical entrepreneurship tools, namely a Lean Canvas Model. The third component consists of training in presentation techniques, not limited but including how to make a good pitch to investors and industry professionals. A fourth component includes the presentation proper, made to a shark-tank audience.
Expert opinion
Resources needed
StartUp PhD needs between one and two full professors, preferably with PhDs or research done in entrepreneurship and innovation. The alumni should come from scientific courses, which would be more appropriate to create scalable startups and spinoffs.
Evidence of success
The class' capacity has expanded to 22, given the University of Évora’s alumni increased interested in the course. 117 PhD students have taken the class, all of whom develop full business plans, and two spin-offs have been created. Since PhDs are long, and its students usually are focused on developing R&D careers, the responsible professors view this as successful; the main objective of the course is not directly to foster the creation of spin-offs, but to foster an entrepreneurial mindset.
Potential for learning or transfer
The course’s structure can be tweaked and is subject to improvement. Namely, the total number of hours, whether it should be an optional course or not, and what the target audience should be (they may not be doctoral students only; they could be master's students or researchers; or they could also be mixed groups, including master's students and teachers, for example) are aspects that can be fine-tuned according to each region’s needs.
As specified previously, this course works best in fostering an entrepreneurial mindset in PhD students from scientific and technological fields, since they usually lack classes focused on business development and benefit the most from learning how to create highly scalable companies. Thus, partners with technological and scientific fields with lots of students, but with low company birthrates, would benefit the most.