Entrepreneurship

The $5 Challenge

Posted on by Claire Galvin

Aspiring Entrepreneurs Use Money to Make Money

In his “Risks and Rewards of Entrepreneurship” course, management professor Timothy Folta gave student groups $5 and told them to use it as start-up cash for a new business. The project was designed to spur creativity around new business ideas.

Students had one week to brainstorm ideas, but once they received the cash, they had only two hours to make as much money as possible.

Interestingly, the group that made the most money did not even use the start-up funds.Continue Reading

Meriden Veteran Goes from Military Service to Entrepreneurship

Posted on by Melissa Ferrigno

Record-Journal- When Gulaid and Davina Ismail’s second child Issaq was born three years ago, the child suffered from acid reflux so badly he threw up often. The couple was going through plenty of infant clothes.

“We were constantly changing clothes and throwing them out when they get stained,” Davina said. “So we asked ourselves ‘why don’t we start making clothes ourselves?'”

Gulaid Ismail, a U.S. Marine who served seven months in Fallujah, Iraq, was able to get some assistance from Veterans Administration programs and the couple soon started Dribblebabies, a baby and toddler web-based store for parents five years after his honorable discharge.

Honoring Veterans 365 Days a Year

Posted on by Claire Hall
Angel Charles, Connecticut National Guard and 2015 EBV Participant
Angel Charles, Connecticut National Guard and 2015 EBV Participant (Nathan Oldham/UConn School of Business)

 

UConn’s Entrepreneurship Bootcamp for Veterans Helps Military Heroes Become Business Moguls

The UConn School of Business has a strong and proud history of serving the educational and career needs of military leaders and veterans, a tradition that dates back to its earliest days.

After WWII, the university offered business classes at Fort Trumbull in New London to serve returning GIs. The creation of a full-time MBA program on the Storrs campus in 1960, another milestone at the School of Business, occurred as a direct result of a contract to expand educational opportunities for members of the Air Force.Continue Reading

How Veterans Can Sign Up for Entrepreneurial Training Through College Initiatives

Posted on by Melissa Ferrigno

New York Post- Last year, Army Reserves veteran Dr. Stephannie L. Addo-Zuniga was knee-deep in the trenches on a daily basis from 8 a.m. to midnight, relying on her tenacity and perseverance to pull her through.

This wasn’t army bootcamp, but an intense learning initiative offered through Entrepreneurship Bootcamp for Veterans with Disabilities at the University of Connecticut.

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MasterCard Worldwide Champions Women at Work

Posted on by Claire Hall

MasterCard Worldwide, the recent platinum sponsor of UConn’s third annual Women Entrepreneurs Empowerment Forum, has been a long-time champion of women in the workplace.

In addition to offering a powerful mentoring program to help women advance up the career ladder within its own company, MasterCard also monitors gender issues around the globe.Continue Reading

‘Top Notch’

Posted on by Claire Hall
UConn EBV Class of 2015
EBV Class of 2015 (Lisa Ducharme)

UConn Graduates 25 from EBV Program; Veteran Entrepreneurs Poised to Start Own Businesses

After the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, retired U.S. Marine Corp. Staff Sergeant Lawrence “LD” Dapo’s assignment was to fly then-Vice President Cheney to an undisclosed, secure location.

“It was all business that day,” Dapo recalled. “I had no time to reflect on the tragedy until afterwards. But that was the day I knew I would marry my wife. She was quite the trooper.”Continue Reading

Terrific Tea-riffic!

Posted on by Claire Hall
Mario Leite ’98 and Souvannee Leite ’98
Mario Leite ’98 and Souvannee Leite ’98 (Nathan Oldham/UConn School of Business)

Enterprising Husband-and-Wife Team Create Award-Winning, Tea-infused Ice Cream

What happens when you combine two of America’s top comfort foods with the ambition and knowledge of an enterprising UConn husband-and-wife team?

The result is an award-winning, tea-infused dessert, called Tea•rrific! Ice Cream. The company, founded in 2011, is now producing 23,000 pints of ice cream a month, which is sold at Whole Foods, Stop & Shop and specialty stores and restaurants from Maine to the Washington D.C.-area.Continue Reading

Accelerate UConn Welcomes 1st Class of Entrepreneurs

Posted on by Melissa Ferrigno

UConn Health- Accelerate UConn, a National Science Foundation (NSF) entrepreneurship program at UConn, has selected 10 faculty-student teams to receive seed grants and business training aimed at more quickly and successfully commercializing early-stage technologies developed at the University.

Cosmo Editor Shares Advice

Posted on by Claire Hall

Joanna Coles, Cosmopolitan Magazine

Work Becomes Easier When You Get to the Top

How do I ask for a raise?

That’s one of the most common questions that the editors of Cosmopolitan magazine are asked every year, said Editor-in-Chief Joanna Coles.

Coles, who since 2012 has led the world’s largest women’s magazine, with 18 million readers in the U.S. alone, regaled some 300 women with stories of career and life, at the third annual Women Entrepreneurs Empowerment Forum on Sept. 18. The event was presented by Platinum Sponsor MasterCard and hosted by the UConn School of Business at UConn Stamford.Continue Reading

Kevin Bouley’s Passion Is Promoting Connecticut’s Brainpower, Creativity, Innovations

Posted on by Claire Hall

As a serial entrepreneur and angel investor, Kevin Bouley ’80 is always searching for the next great innovation.

But what he really seeks—which is even more rare and a thousand times more intriguing—is the next great innovator.

“I spend a fair amount of time at UConn, visiting the labs and walking the hallways meeting with faculty, undergraduate students and graduate students, looking for that spark, looking for that student or faculty member who wants to build a business, wants to launch a company based on a technology they’ve developed in a lab,” he said.Continue Reading