Entrepreneurship has always been celebrated in our culture - from early innovators such as Christopher Columbus to Thomas Edison, The Wright Brothers to Henry Ford. By the 20th century, accelerating technological innovation rooted within universities gave rise to a new culture, the hacker culture. This spawned a new type of entrepreneur embodied by role models such as Michael Dell, Steve Jobs and Larry Page. These founders set an example for what the university ecosystem can breed given the density of talent, diversity of opinions from academic leaders, greater willingness for students to take risks, and fewer preconceived notions from a role or company. Over the past 20 years, dozens of university-born founders have emerged, disrupting an incumbent industry, or creating a new one of their own. Thus a flourishing ecosystem was built to support a new generation of founders: the student founder. The State of Student Startups shares our take on the major players that make this ecosystem what it is today - from professors to program managers, student leaders to service providers - and the factors that are that are fueling the next generation of founders. About RDV: Rough Draft Ventures is General Catalyst's student-focused program that backs founders at the university level. RDV is supporting and connecting the largest network of student entrepreneurs.

1. The State
of Student
Startups
May 2018

2. At Rough Draft Ventures,
General Catalyst's student led
program that backs founders at
the university level, we help the
next generation of founders
launch and scale their startups.
We believe that universities
foster game-changing ventures,
and that today, more than ever,
this is the best place to start a
company. Here's why:

3. Computer science has always had deep roots
within the university ecosystem.
1944 - The Mark 1
A general purpose
electromechanical computer
that was used World War II
founded at Harvard.
1947 - Project Whirlwind
The first digital computer at
MIT.
1946 - The ENIAC
The first digital computer at
the University of
Pennsylvania.
1965 - DENDRAL
Artificial intelligence
program founded at
Stanford

4. This led to the rise of a new culture: the hacker
culture.

5. Tech- focused
founders began to
emerge out of
university
ecosystems,
Yale-founded
1971
Harvard-founded
1975
University of Texas Austin-founded
1984
Stanford-founded
1995
Stanford-founded
1998

6. building new software to disrupt
incumbent industries,
Michigan State University-founded
2004
Harvard University-founded
2004
MIT-founded
2005
MIT-founded
2007
Harvard Business School-founded2009
Northeastern-founded
1999
Iowa State University-founded
2001
University of Pennsylvania- founded
2001
University of Houston-founded
2003
University of Maryland-founded
2003

7. and creating brand new categories
of their own.
Harvard Business School-founded
2012
Stanford University-founded
2012
Over the years,
thousands of
student-led
startups have
emerged.
>
MIT-founded
2010
University of Pennsylvania- founded
2010
Harvard Business School-founded
2010
Stanford University-founded
2012
Yale University-founded
2011
Harvard Business School-founded
2011

8. - Michael Dell
"You don't have to be a
genius or a visionary or even
a college graduate to be
successful. You just need a
framework and a dream. "

9. This proved that university culture is
a distinct place for startup incubation.
Diverse and credible views
from peers and prominent
academic leaders
Willingness to take risks
Hotbed of talent for thought-
provoking conversation
Classmates and roommates
as natural co-founders
Research driven learning

10. It's clear that students care
about entrepreneurship
more now than ever.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goal

11. Universities have increased
their focus on entrepreneurship
both inside and outside the
classroom:
- 300+ entrepreneurship classes and programs
- 46% increase in CS/information science degrees
- 29% increase in engineering degrees in past 10 years
- 2x as many freshman want to be an entrepreneur *
*Kauffman Foundation

12. University leaders
are establishing dedicated
entrepreneurship programs,

13. and setting up new
workplaces.
Leslie E-lab
Innovation Lab
LILIE Lab
The Sky Deck
Garage

14. They're providing dedicated
funding resources,
Northeastern Venture Accelerator
COBBE
Idaho Entrepreneurship Challenge

15. and hosting competitions to
foster new ideas and bring
together talented teams.
NYU $300k
Entrepreneurs Challenge
Penn Startup Showcase
Virginia Tech Global
Entrepreneur Challenge
Rice Launch Challenge
MIT Entrepreneurship
Competition
Princeton Tiger Launch

16. Meanwhile,
students are creating
their own resources
to support peers.
For example, CMU's Scottie Ventures &
NYU Strategic Venture society teaches
the principles of venture capital to
interested community members.
Stanford BASES leads thought leader
classes and founder summits.

17. hackathons
fireside chats
office hours
workshops
This includes:

18. “Our one-year immersive program exposes
Carnegie Mellon students to the venture
business. By giving them a macro-perspective
on a wide variety of industries, we hope to
inspire students to start companies in spaces
they find fascinating.”
- Akshay Goradia, Co-founder & President,
Scottie Ventures
Students have fostered hundreds of entrepreneurial
student groups across the nation.

19. "More than 65,000 students come to 250+ Major
Leauge Hacking events each year. The next Mark
Zuckerberg or Marissa Mayer are at an MLH event
right now."
- Jonathan Gottfried, Co-founder, Major League
Hacking
And student-led groups have
created new startup-focused events
at scale.

20. "The entrepreneurial spirit is only increasing at the university level, where
students are turning their class projects into a scalable business. We're
determined to help student founders set up and jumpstart their business
with the right banking resources."
- Priya Rajan, SVB
Large companies are dedicating resources
to student-led startups, enabling students to
build products faster and cheaper
than ever before,

21. while student-founded startups like
HubSpot, Snap, and Stripe
are creating new programs
to help startups get off the ground.
Stripe AtlasSnapchat AccelerateHubSpot for Startups

22. At the same time, venture firms are creating new
programs to back the best founders.

23. A new generation of student
founders is emerging today.

24. And they’re focusing on
common themes.
Less stuff, more experiences
While the majority of millennials have under $1k in their bank
accounts, their choosing to spend it on experiences rather than
physical goods 1
Student loans
2With roughly 70% of graduates leaving college with student debt,
student founders are hoping to reduce this burden for themselves
and for their peers.

25. These themes shed light on important
problems this generation is facing.
3As technology becomes more pervasive across industries,
companies are increasingly relying upon tech teams in house to
drive their product innovations. Student founders are taking a fresh
approach to making the lives of the next generation of developers
better through new tools.
Developer tools for a new tech enabled
workforce
4 Student founders, make and female alike, are building products
that improve the experience for women, reflecting the political and
social climate of today.
Solving the needs of female customers

26. And these are areas that may be most ripe
for disruption today.
Tools for R&D
As students complete courses that require research and
development, they’re frustrated by long timeslines and dated
hardware. They’re starting new companies to bring software to
R&D and make science more efficient.
5
6
Leveraging data to accelerate discovery
and improve patient experience
With a massive influx of medical data in every aspect of the
healthcare system, Student founders are applying AI and ML to
reduce time and labor, helping parents get better fast.

27. We started Rough Draft Ventures to
support and connect the largest network
of next generation entrepreneurs.

28. We work with over 150 companies
and 250+ founders across 30+
universities,
c o m p a n i e s
1 5 0 +
f o u n d e r s
2 5 0 +
u n i v e r s i t i e s
3 0 +
c o m m u n i t y
G R O W I N G
& h a c k a t h o n s
E V E N T Sd i v e r s i t y & i n c l u s i o n
S U P P O R T I N G

29. and we're excited to continue supporting
game-changing companies getting started
at universities nationwide.
c o m p a n i e s
1 2 0 +
f o u n d e r s
2 5 0 +
u n i v e r s i t i e s
3 0 +
c o m m u n i t y
G R O W I N G
& h a c k a t h o n s
E V E N T Se x p e r i m e n t s a n d
i n i t i a t i v e s
N E W

30. www.roughdraft.vc
Created by Natalie Bartlett & designed by Risham Dhillon
with contribution from Denali Tietjen & Peter Boyce II