Kogod School of Business has opened a new incubator offering a $1,500 grant to selected teams.
American University’s Kogod School of Business has opened a new incubator as part of its Sustainable Entrepreneurship and Innovation Initiative. Selected teams will receive $1,500 as a grant and be able to apply for seed funding from the institution’s $100,000 Entrepreneurship Venture Fund.
So far, five teams have been accepted into the inaugural cohort with another dozen applications being looked at.
Despite the incubator, the venture fund and the initiative all being new developments, the Washington DC-based university’s first foray into entrepreneurship dates back to 1987. Until recently, however, the university had shown no ambitions to further grow this entrepreneurship course.
Stevan Holmberg, director of the innovation initiative, said: “It was time for the next step, and that step was moving from learning entrepreneurship in a classroom to living it in a live lab. We are seeing a number of local governments and organisations recognising that entrepreneurial ventures drive employment opportunities and economic growth. At the same time, this fits into the school’s role to continue building on the educational mission of the university.”