Changes

Entrepreneurship and Innovation are two of the four IE pillars, alongside Humanities and Diversity. Students are exposed to entrepreneurship and innovation through their academic programs as well as University-wide programs facilitating access to Entrepreneurship resources and events. Students willing to start their own company can access the Area 31 incubator or the Venture Lab accelerator. Students can find support from numerous Entrepreneurs-in-Residence as well as Mentors and Investors-in-Residence. Selected ventures can further be selected to seek funding at Venture Days organized both in Spain and abroad. There is also significant support from the Corporate Sponsors of the Entrepreneurship Center as well as from the faculty. Students can access a vast international alumni entrepreneurship network. IE startups include: Source{d}, Bioncotech, Tyba, Busuu, Masmovil, Ninjamails, Marsi Bionics, Canard Drones, Bitbrain.

1500+ students take part in Entrepreneurship courses each year. Entrepreneurship is at IE by the Entrepreneurship Center and the academic Entrepreneurship Department. Students can take Entrepreneurship courses as part of their BBA and MBA concentration or in the elective components of their degrees. IE is further committed to educational innovation, having pioneered in launching a department for Learning Innovation. IE has released the WOW room as well as high-impact Exponential Learning and several MOOCs and integrates technology to the classroom actively. IE’s online MBA is further ranked #1 worldwide by QS (2018). Other centers that cater to I&E include the Center for Diversity, Center for Corporate Social Innovation, Global Corporation Center and Center for Governance of Change. IE further sponsors or co-organizes several I&E events including: South Summit (largest startup fair in Southern Europe), Thinkers50 and IE Rockets.

IE University has been very engaged with both big and small industry players from its foundation. Both master and undergrad students engage with businesses from the start of their programs. Freshers and sophomores are part of the IE Labs, which act as consulting laboratories where they can work first hand with real-world cases. Companies collaborate due to their great interest in out-of-the-box thinking young students can offer to their companies. For instance, 2017’s Tech Lab for master students was sponsored by IBM and mentored students to solve an internal case. In the following years, students have mandatory internships that enrich both their personal careers and the industry. Therefore, when IE students graduate they have a clear picture of the industry’s options and can decide where to kickstart their career path. Regarding the entrepreneurship landscape, IE has developed various initiatives in the past years where businesses either fund, mentor or inspire students that want to develop their own projects. Examples of these are the Repsol Foundation Entrepreneurs Fund or the IE Rockets, which acts as an incubator for education startups.