GE 393 RLP Business Plan Workshop for Technology Entrepreneurs

Week 1

David E. GoldbergDepartment of General Engineering

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Urbana, Illinois 61801

deg@uiuc.edu

So You Want to Be an Entrepreneur

• Dot-com collapse was a craze, but it had a real component.

• Entrepreneurship is here to stay.• Logical extension of Handy’s work

portfolio.• Forces of technology revolution, end of

the Cold War, reduction in transaction costs.

Business Plan as Ticket

• Business plans are tickets to

technology-based entrepreneur.

• Garage-based ventures have grown up.

• Established rules of the game to start

ups, funding, and new companies.

Introduction

• What are goals of the course?

• Who are we? Who are you?

• Prerequisites & seriousness

• Course materials

• Course schedule

• An aside on IP & disclosure of ideas

• Business concept selection

Intro (cont.)

• Team selection

• Course diary

• Course grading

• Sources of information

• Forms

• Concept selection

• Brainstorming

Course Goals

• Create plausibly viable business plans for technology-based businesses.

• Means: teams of students working with faculty and off-campus mentors with repeated presentation, Q&A, and close feedback.

• Not a lecture course.

Deconstruct Goal

• Plausibly viable: Must make persuasive argument for realistic business. No going through the motions, no half-hearted attempts

• Technology-based: Technology must be integral part of business.

• Businesses not trading firms: No license deals, no real estate deals, no security deals.

Who Are We? You?

• Marianne Dickerson, marianne.dickerson@rrd.com

• David E. Goldberg, deg@uiuc.edu

• Other mentors.

• Who are you? How many different departments? Business ideas? How did you hear of class? Why are you here?

Prerequisites

• Formal: Junior standing or consent of instructor

• Informal: GE 393 MJL, Technology Opportunity Assessment, TTh 4-5:20, 101 TB.

• Ideally: Take tech feasibility plan and create full business plan

• If not, extra reading and work for student.

Seriousness

• Engineering/science students think business courses are easy and not rigorous.

• GE 393 RLP is rigorous.• Writing excellent business plan in 14

weeks is not easy.• We will be writing excellent business

plans here.

Is BPWTE for You?

• Are you– Entering Cozad Bplan Competition?– Starting a business now or after school?– Taking an entrepreneurial-related job?

• If yes, then you may be serious enough.

• If no, ask yourself if you want to work this hard.

Course Materials

• TE

• TPW

• LLE

• HRFR

• NVC

• Optional: GM, RM, LG, WSJ

Course Schedule

• 14 weeks is not a long time.

• Important to get off and running quickly.

• Important to come prepared each week to meetings with mentors.

• Presentations are key milestones.

• Hard work (or lack) will show.

• Review the schedule.

An Aside on IP

• IP = Intellectual property not Illinois Power

• Ideas belong to inventors who are expected to protect their ideas.

• Concepts presented in class & in BPs.

• If concepts cannot be presented without NDAs, not appropriate for this class

Business Concept Selection

• Two types of concepts:– student-contributed– OTM or faculty-contributed

• OTM & faculty-contributed to be distributed

• Need form BC for student concepts today.

• Need concept champions today.

Team Selection

• Teams consist of minimum of four (4) class members.

• Team members not enrolled need to sign up for continuing education credit.

• Next week will hold concept-team agora.

• Match students to concepts.

Agora

• Concept champions will set up shop.

• Students will read over concepts.

• Students will talk to concept champions to try to enroll in teams.

• Team of four can declare itself closed.

• Concept champions can abandon idea.

• Unclaimed ideas can be claimed by new champions.

Agora Aftermath

• Once teams settled, file form TS.• Members can switch teams (subject to

minimum number) until week 5.• File form TS for any team change

(members/names/concept).• Concept champion is not necessarily

CEO.• Team organization between team &

mentor

Course Diary

• All students required to keep course diary.

• Official IP record (legal document).

• Records progress and contributions.

• Turned in at end of semester to mentor to help in mentor’s assessment.

Course Grading

• Grade decomposition– Business Plan 50%– Final presentation 25%– Mentor assessment 25%

• Grade influences– Jury evaluation of presentations– off-campus mentors– Form PA

Additional Info

• Great info on the web

• Plan to get business librarian to help us

with searches.

• Look at links

Forms

• Form BC: Business concept submission

• Form TS: Team selection/modification

• Form PA: Peer assessment

• Form CL: Course exit checklist

• Form BPC: Business plan critique

Business Concept Phase

• Handout OTM/Faculty concepts.

• Collect, copy, and handout student-

submitted concepts.

• Identify student concept champions.

Group Innovation

• A key challenge early on is to innovate as a group.

• Structured brainstorming as a solution to the problem.

• Motivation, props, and method of brainstorming.