Entrepreneurship and New Ventures

Course Description

This course introduces students to the fundamentals of creating and managing entrepreneurial opportunities through both, a practical “hands on” and a theoretical approach. The course deals with entrepreneurship at every stage of the process by covering the following topics: evaluating new opportunities, formulating the business model, launching and growing startups, dealing with founding team/family dynamics, financing the entrepreneurial business, negotiating venture capital funding and exiting the venture. More specifically, the areas covered within the course are:  

● Types of entrepreneurship

● Skills and characteristics found in entrepreneurs

● Types of opportunities and how to find them

● Improving the business idea: lean startup

● Business model generation

● Building a high powered team

● Entrepreneurial finance: funding the venture. Venture capitalists and business angels.  

● Management of a high growth venture

● Exiting the successful venture 

Course Goals and Methodology

The key objectives of the course are:

• Understand what an opportunity is and what traits do good opportunities share.

• Put together all the jigsaw pieces necessary for the foundation of a venture through deliberate thought on the fundamental aspects of launching and growing the business.  

• Learn what the best sources for financing a venture are and how to tap them.

• Observe how successful entrepreneurs manage their ventures in the context of high sales growth. 

These objectives will be achieved through both, general theory sessions and theory into practice sessions. During the general theory sessions, students will be provided with practical frameworks to analyze decision making in an entrepreneurial setting. The theory into practice sessions are an arena in which students will work on solving reallife problems and cases having to do with the concepts covered in the general theory sessions. In these sessions, the group will analyze and discuss cases of successful new ventures (i.e.: Dropbox, Rent the runway or Chegg), watch videos of successful entrepreneurs and venture capitalists and will be able to expose their ideas during the sessions.

Learning Objectives

General Skills:

• Capacity for analysis & synthesis;
• Problem-solving skills;
• Decision-making skills;
• Capacity for critical thinking;
• Collaborative learning/Teamwork skills;
• Leadership skills;
• Interpersonal skills;
• Ability to put theory into practice;
• Capacity for learning and refreshing knowledge;
• Autonomous learning skills/Self-sufficiency

Instrumental Skills:

• Analysis and synthesis skills
• Organization and planning skills
• Oral and written communication in a foreign language
• Skills to obtain and analyze information from different sources
• Decision making and problem-solving skills

Personal Skills:

• Team work and interpersonal relations skills
• Personal relations skills
• Ethical compromise within the work place

Systemic skills:

• Autonomous learning skills
• Creativity
• Leadership
• Initiative and entrepreneurship

Required Texts  

The materials for the theory classes will be facilitated to the students in the form of PowerPoint slides. The slides will be made available to the students in the subject platform. Class slides and professor explanations will mostly follow two core subject manuals:  

● Entrepreneurship   William Bygrave & Andrew Zacharakis (2014)   Wiley, 3rd edition

● Entrepreneurship Robert Hisrich, Michael Peters, Dean Shepherd (2016) McGraw Hill, 10th edition  

However, there are other books and manuals the professor will refer to during the sessions. 

Course Requirements and Grading

Assessment will involve one exam at the end of the term in which the students will be evaluated on all the materials covered during the course sessions. Students will also be required to complete assignments which will be carried out in class. 

Mid-term Exam 20%

Final Exam 20%

Work in class 45%

Class participation 15%  

Both, the mid-term and the final exam will consist of a multiple choice test and a short questions exam. The part of the grade based on the work in class will consist of a number of problems/cases/videos the students will need to solve in groups. The part of the grade based on class participation will be assigned to students active in class discussion, contributing with examples of companies they know, situations they have experienced or news they have read in relation with the topic being discussed in class. Exam dates will not be changed under any circumstances. 

Course contents
PART 1: ENTREPRENEURING: PERSON AND PROCESS
UNIT 1: What is entrepreneurship? The macro perspective.
UNIT 2: The entrepreneur, entrepreneurial traits and the entrepreneurial process. How and where to spot good opportunities
UNIT 3: The founding team. “Dos” and “Don´ts” of forming a team for the founding entrepreneur.

PART 2: DEVELOPING SUCCESFUL BUSINESS IDEAS
UNIT 4: Acing the design and development of an effective business model. The venture strategy going forward.
UNIT 5: Sources of financing available from the venture foundation to the company listing.
UNIT 6: Surviving venture capital. Their role in helping you succeed as an entrepreneur and how to effectively negotiate with them.
UNIT 7: Why is growth important. How to prompt and manage venture growth.

PART 3: OTHER FORMS OF ENTREPRENEURSHIP
UNIT 8: Other forms of entrepreneurship