Interdisciplinary Center for Entrepreneurship & E-business

Description

The Interdisciplinary Center for Entrepreneurship and E-Business (ICEEB) is dedicated to developing the entrepreneurial spirit at North Carolina A&T State University. The ICEEB offers a variety of programs to help students explore and experience entrepreneurship. Students can take entrepreneurial courses to earn a Certificate in Entrepreneurship. The ICEEB matches students with successful entrepreneurs to provide hands-on experiential learning opportunities such as the Entrepreneurial Scholars Program, Mentoring, and the E-Lab Course. Qualified start-ups from the E-Lab will be hosted in the Virtual Incubator for a year. Outreach activities sponsored by the ICEEB include a Lecture Series, Seminars and Workshops, and the Annual Collegiate Entrepreneurs Conference. The ICEEB Staff, the Collegiate Entrepreneurs Organization (CEO), and the Faculty Interest Group provide support for students in their entrepreneurial endeavors. Outstanding student entrepreneurs and Business Plan Competition winners are recognized at the annual Entrepreneurship Awards function.

Mission

Provide a platform for students:

To promote and foster entrepreneurship as a career option.
To provide opportunities for student to meet and work with practicing entrepreneurs.
To increase students' participation in e-business.
To encourage and support experiential learning in entrepreneurship.
To facilitate collaboration with community organizations to strengthen minority business.
To encourage and support research in entrepreneurship and e-business.
To support fellow colleagues pursing a venture and/or gain support from alumni.

Activities

Lecture Series
- Throughout the year, the ICEEB invites prominent entrepreneurs to the campus to share their stories. The lecture series is opened to the general public. It is an opportunity for students to meet with and learn from successful entrepreneurs as well for the ICEEB to build relationships with the business community.

Seminars and Workshops
- The seminars and workshops, while providing a valuable education to our students and local entrepreneurs, also provide an excellent networking opportunity for students and faculty.

Incubator
- The ICEEB has developed a space for student entrepreneurs to work on their projects. This space is also used for networking events and workshops tailored to entrepreneurs.

Entrepreneurship Clinic
- The Center of Excellence in Entrepreneurship and Innovation has put together an informative series with dynamic consultants to cultivate your ideas and feed your current knowledge on the subject of entrepreneurship.

Collegiate Entrepreneurs Conference
- The ICEEB sponsors the Annual Collegiate Entrepreneurs Conference to showcase and celebrate the entrepreneurial spirit that is thriving on the North Carolina A&T State University Campus. The one-day event includes student presentations, workshops, keynote speaker, and networking opportunities.

Aggie Accelerator
- This is fast paced start-up development program that spans 8 weeks during the semester. Twelve students are selected to participate where they -
  - understand and apply the build, measure, learn philosophy of lean startup development
  - know the structure of the problem interview methodology
  - draft and refine a customer interview script
  - test that script using first improve and then real-world prospective customers
  - prospect potential interviewees to continue desirability testing
  - know the resources to leverage to build an MVP, particularly non-software development options
  - become familiar with the best practices for finding and vetting software partners
  - become familiar with resources to quantify their progress toward customer-problem fit on their way to achieving product-market fit.
  - understand the structure of the business model, B2C, B2B platform
  - project costs associated with the next 6 months of operations, focused specifically on customer discovery and development activities
  - understand and apply principles of value-based pricing
  - project revenue associated with the next 6 months of operations
  - understand the importance of evaluating company financial sustainability and the concept of opportunity costs
  - calculate their run-rate and runway