Will inspire future innovators
NHH wants to increase innovation among master students. A prestige course for up to 50 potential entrepreneurs is underway.
This week sees the launch of the new course Global Business Venturing, with a number of profiled innovation experts from Norway and abroad as lecturers.
- We will inspire students to think big, says Vice Rector Helge Thorbjørnsen.
The students are assembled in Auditorium B for the first day of the new course. This will be their laboratory for the next few months, where they will be encouraged to experiment and innovate.
Product development, service innovation, financial entrepreneurship, commercialisation, and business models are just some of the key themes that will be covered in NHH’s new academic development.
NHH and Gelato
It is not without pride that the Norwegian School of Economics and the successful start-up company Gelato.com together kick-off this super programme for 50 master students. Entrepreneurs and business leaders with practical experience from some of the largest companies in the world are being brought to NHH as guest speakers.
The school is also bringing academic experts in the field to lecture on the course.
These guest lecturers will meet a large group of students who are considering the possibility of setting up their own companies and as such have a particular interest in entrepreneurship and innovation.
Did not hesitate
NHH’s master students had no doubts about the new initiative. Fifty students with an entrepreneurial outlook and an interest in innovation were given a place on the course Almost as many were rejected.
- We want to focus more clearly on innovation and entrepreneurship, and this course is an important part of this focus. The aim is to inspire students to think big and scalability in entrepreneurship, and give them both empirical and theoretical knowledge on the way, says Thorbjørnsen.
Gelato-entrepreneur Henrik Müller-Hansen is characterised as one of Norway' s most successful entrepreneurs. The company offers a software platform for the printing industry and global companies. It employs about 80 people and delivers printed matter to 40 countries.
Education before innovation
Müller-Hansen is convinced that more of them will be able to establish a company in the future. It is not more difficult and cumbersome to develop a start-up in Norway, as many claim.
- Norway is a wonderful country for entrepreneurship and provides world class conditions. Now we will make these even better in order to establish global, disruptive companies. We believe innovation is driven by education and knowledge, and this is why the NHH initiative is so important. The autumn semester is going to be magical for the 50 selected students, says Gelato-entrepreneur.
During the first lecture Thorbjørnsen focused on how and why NHH will connect students with academics and entrepreneurs from across the world that have first-hand experience of turning ideas into successful products and services.
Some tasters from the course:
- The history of Silicon Valley and why it´s the startup hub of the world by Mark Bertelsen, Senior Partner at Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati
- Happiness spurs innovation by Nadav Shir, Stockholm School of Economics and affiliated with New York University, Stern School of Business
- How to hire and build a team that can deliver products and services that change industries by David Bizer, Founder and CEO of Talent Fountai
- Preparing & Managing the transition from a tech start-up to a public company by Enrique Perez-Hernandez, Head of Technology Banking at Morgan Stanley
- Building the organization, and dealing with the change that success brings by Petter A Stordalen, Norwegian investor, hotel "tycoon", property developer
- The course concludes with student presentations