In February, CSU’s College of Business was the first in Colorado to host the highly successful 3 Day Startup program, an experiential entrepreneurship program.

The 3 Day Startup program is for students interested in entrepreneurship who want a quick program to show them the basics to get started on a path to developing a business. The program is held over three days. Similar to Start-Up Weekend, students come to the weekend with a variety of backgrounds and levels of entrepreneurial interest and experience, but everyone leaves with entrepreneurship essentials and time with an actual business. 3 Day Startups have been held at universities across the country and world, including Harvard, MIT and the University of Texas-Austin.

Successful formation of six companies

Easton Robbins, a business management major at CSU, participated in the program and learned how to write a business plan in a matter of minutes as compared to months.

“I actually developed a strategy for my startup that I plan to implement in the near future,” said Robbins. “In addition to naming my company, I developed a clear and vivid mission statement.”

A diverse group of 40 engineers, computer scientists, business students, and other creative undergraduates and graduate students as well as alumni participated in the program, forming six companies from the experience:

• SMACO – the “Uber” of moving companies would allow college students to be the contract labor for people who are moving a whole or partial household.
• Dizo – a dissolvable casing for supplements, making it easier to bring protein supplements to the gym by dissolving them in water.
• ViRality – a company producing virtual reality campus tours to send to prospective students along with branded Google Cardboard virtual reality goggles.
• Pocket Pass – a game for tailgate parties, picnics and other outdoor gatherings where players throw a football at various targets.  Pocket Pass is similar to corn hole or other bean bag toss games.
• The Space Research Company – a company that provides 10 cm square black boxes for biotech scientists to send their experiments into space.
• Brite Bulb – a smart light bulb that responds to voice commands regarding light, music and cell phones in multiple rooms.

“The students were really appreciative of the opportunity,” said Christine Chin, interim director of the Institute for Entrepreneurship at CSU’s College of Business.  “They learned about customer discovery, aligning their product/service with customer needs, rapid prototyping, business model creation, telling a story in their pitch, and both good and bad team dynamics.  At the Boot Camp prior to the actual workshop, participants expressed their passion for entrepreneurship, the ability to work for themselves and to create something of value.”

About 3 Day Startup

Founded by a group of cross-disciplinary students frustrated with the unexpressed potential for startups in the university environment, the initial 3 Day Startup program took place at the University of Texas in 2008.

The student organization incorporated as a nonprofit in 2010 and began expansion to universities across the globe. While early programs focused on strictly technology- and web-enabled startups, demand has led the team to expand the program to function across broader entrepreneurial endeavors. Schools have hosted 3DS programs focused on themes such as social innovation, energy, culinary, hardware and more.

More information

For more information, visit the website.