LONGHORNSTARTUP UT Austin Spring 2020 Syllabus as of 1/23/2020 by Joshua Baer & Mellie Price
------Longhorn Startup Lab (LSL): Interdisciplinary Entrepreneurship Practicum ------
Longhorn Startup Lab (LSL) is an intensive project-based course in the Spring semester that identifies student entrepreneurs who are building scalable technology companies and gets them real course credit for working on their startups while still in school. These students receive weekly one-on-one mentoring sessions with successful entrepreneurs. The semester culminates in a Demo Day where the students present their companies to the Austin community. Any student from any college can register but final team selection is by approval of the instructor.
Each team that is selected will also receive other benefits. This list is subject to change. ● Personalized mentoring from Austin entrepreneurs ● Pitch onstage to 1,000 people at Demo Day at the end of the semester ● $1,000 cash grant for each team ● $5,000 Amazon Web Services free hosting credits ● Free coworking memberships at Capital Factory from January-August 2020 ● Free table at the Austin Startup Crawl during SXSW ● Chance to pitch onstage at SXSW ● Demo Day winners interested in continuing to work on their company after completion of Longhorn Startup Lab will have the opportunity to accept a guaranteed spot in the Capital Factory Accelerator and a $25,000 investment from Capital Factory Fund. Participation in the Accelerator and Fund is optional and commences after the last day of class and the independent submission of grades.
For more information visit LonghornStartup.com
Course Numbers
Open Registration, additional application for instructor approval ES377E = Longhorn Startup Lab (“Interdisciplinary Entrepreneurship”) (Cockrell ENG) CS374L = Longhorn Startup Lab (“Interdisciplinary Entrepreneurship”) (CNS/CS) MAN337 = Longhorn Startup Lab (McCombs) DES350 = Longhorn Startup Lab (Design) COM325 = Longhorn Startup Lab (Communications) ITD350 = Longhorn Startup Lab
Application Process
Apply for the Lab by going to the LonghornStartup.com website and clicking on the Register tab and then selecting the Lab.
Class Format
6:00pm Thank Sponsors 6:05pm Introduce Guest Mentors 6:15pm Weekly updates by each team 7:00pm Pizza & Office Hours with Mentors 8:00pm Adjourn
Weekly Schedule ● Tuesday Team Meetings 6:00pm-7:00pm at TBD ● Thursday Team Updates 6:00pm-7:00pm at GDC 1.304 ● Thursday Office Hours 7:00pm-8:00pm in GDC Lobby
Specific Dates ● January 23 - Welcome & Ask Me Anything ○ Review Mentor bios ○ Decide on team roles and equity ● January 28 - Team Meeting ● January 30 - Mentor Speed Dating 6-9pm ● February 4 - Capital Factory coworking tour ● February 6 - Office Hours ○ Legal Guest Mentors for company formation ○ Lean Canvas due ○ Founder Equity due ○ Titles and Responsibilities due ● February 11 - Team Meeting ● February 13 - Office Hours ● February 15 - SXSW Deadline ○ SXSW Student Pitch Applications Due ● February 18 - Team Meeting ● February 20 - Office Hours ● February 25 - Team Meeting ● February 27 - Office Hours ● March 3 - Team Meeting ● March 5 - Office Hours ● Thursday, March 12 - (Class moved to Friday this week for SXSW) ● Friday March 13 - SXSW Startup Crawl (replaces 3/12 class). ● March 13 - SXSW Student Pitch (TBD) ● March 17 - Spring Break is March 16-21 (no class) ● March 19 - Spring Break is March 16-21 (no class) ● March 21 - Spring Break is March 16-21 (no class) ● March 24 - Demo Day Practice ● March 26 - Demo Day Practice Pitch (Graded) ○ Video Pitch Due (Individual) ○ Random selection from team to pitch ● March 31 - Team Meeting ● April 2 - First Pitches & Office Hours ● April 7 - Team Meeting ● April 9 - Office Hours ● April 14 - Demo Day Practice ● April 16 - Office Hours ● April 21 - Demo Day Practice ● April 23 - Office Hours ● April 28 - Demo Day Practice ● April 30 - Demo Day Final Pitch (Graded) ○ Random selection from team to pitch ● May 5 - Demo Day Dry Run ● May 7 - Demo Day ● May 8 - Last Day of Classes
Various special events may be scheduled on weekends and other days.
Motivation
Our motto at The University of Texas at Austin is: What Starts Here Changes the World. One of the most effective ways of changing the world is innovation through startups.
Among the 25+ courses at UT Austin that teach entrepreneurship, Longhorn Startup Lab (LSL) is an interdisciplinary practicum for undergraduates on startup teams. We aim to advance these Longhorn Startups by connecting the teams into networks of real world resources: business mentors, investors and Demo Day attendees. Teams receive one-on-one mentoring (“office hours”) from the instructor, mentors and guest mentors on a weekly basis. We aim to give our students practice in operating the machinery of Free Enterprise.
Instructors
Joshua Baer helps people quit their jobs and become entrepreneurs. In 2008 he founded Capital Factory, a startup incubator and co-working space in Austin, Texas. Josh founded his first startup in 1996 in his college dormitory at Carnegie Mellon University and now teaches a class at the University of Texas for student entrepreneurs. Josh was recently recognized as the Austin Community Leader of the Year, Tribeza Person of the Year, Henry Crown Fellow at the Aspen Institute, Eisenhower Fellow and a member of the National Committee on US-China Relations Young Leaders Forum. Josh lives in Austin with his wife Amy and three children. You can follow him on Twitter @joshuabaer.
Mellie Price is managing director of the Texas Health CoLab and executive director of commercialization at Dell Medical School. She is also the director of the Jon Brumley Texas Venture Labs at the McCombs School of Business and adjunct assistant professor of the Longhorn Startup entrepreneurship course.
In her cross-disciplinary roles at The University of Texas at Austin, Price leads programs that support entrepreneurs, partners, inventors, clinicians, researchers, faculty, staff and students in the creation of products and services that improve patient health outcomes and lower the cost of health care.
As an eight-time entrepreneur herself, Price is well-known as a co-founder of the nationally recognized entrepreneurial hub Capital Factory and the corporative innovation consulting firm SoftMatch. She was also the founder and CEO of two health tech startups and a global ticketing software platform, Front Gate Solutions, which was sold to Live Nation in 2015.
Price is a widely respected thought leader, frequent presenter and keynote speaker on pioneering business models and disruptive innovation. She is an active member of the Texas entrepreneurship community and a winner of the Austin Business Journal’s Profiles in Power Award (2015) and its TechFlash Titan Award (2014). A proud member of the Austin community for 30 years, Price is a member of the Board of Directors for PBS Austin, Leadership Austin, and the National LGBTQ Victory Fund. You can follow her on Twitter @mellieprice
Faculty Office Hours
Office hours are held during class time most weeks. Each team will be paired with 2 mentors who agree to meet with them weekly and the Instructors will meet with each team each week as well.
Teaching Assistant
Abigail Partridge & Dawood J Kanchwala Email: [email protected] Office Hours: TBA
The Teaching Assistant assists with registration, organizing speakers and events, promoting them on campus, and screening potential Lab students.
Interested in being a future Teaching Assistant? (apply here)
Undergraduate Catalog Course Descriptions
Longhorn Startup Lab. Interdisciplinary entrepreneurship practicum for teams of students starting companies. Skill development and mentoring in startup formation, teamwork, technology development, market validation, marketing, sales, operations, human resources, program management, intellectual property, and entrepreneurial finance. Emphasis on written and oral presentations of startup activities. Three class hours per week with additional team meetings to be arranged with instructors, any other faculty advisors, and mentors.
Prerequisites
This course has no prerequisites. All students must apply through the application form at longhornstartup.com and be approved by the instructor.
This course may only be taken once.
Independent Inquiry Flag
This course carries the Independent Inquiry flag. Independent Inquiry courses are designed to engage you in the process of inquiry over the course of a semester, providing you with the opportunity for independent investigation of a question, problem, or project related to your major. You should therefore expect a substantial portion of your grade to come from the independent investigation and presentation of your own work.
Team Startup Mentors
Because this is a practicum, we recruit entrepreneurs from the Austin startup community to serve as team mentors, focused on those who have recently participated in a nationally recognized accelerator program. Each team should have two or more mentors from the roster. These mentors provide ongoing practical advice to the teams and help connect them to networks of outside resources. Mentors commit to attending the weekly Thursday office hours sessions for at least 90 minutes. Mentors must pass the University’s standard Criminal Background Check, as detailed on the last page of this Syllabus.
Textbooks
The course textbook is Ash Maurya, Running Lean, O’Reilly Media, 2012.
Among our optional, recommended readings are:
Napoleon Hill, Think and Grow Rich Steven Gary Blank, The Four Steps to the Epiphany, 2006. E. Ries, The Lean Startup, Crown,, 2011. P. Denning and R. Dunham, The Innovator’s Way, MIT Press, 2010. Peter Drucker, Innovation and Entrepreneurship, Harper & Row, 1985. Bill Aulet, Disciplined Entrepreneurship, Wiley, 2013 R. Dorf, T. Byers, Technology Ventures: From Ideas to Enterprise, McGraw Hill, 2008. T. Hopkins, Selling for Dummies, Wiley, 2011.
Videos
These video resources are recommended from Gordon Daugherty at Shockwave Innovations:
So You Wanna Start a Startup? (free): https://vimeo.com/152077006 The Startup Operating System (free): https://vimeo.com/272574365 Developing Your Idea (free): https://vimeo.com/215356614
Lab Objectives
During the course, students will:
1. Learn basics of startup formation 2. Receive advice and introductions from successful, articulate, and committed mentors 3. Get connected to resources needed for the advancement of your startup.
At the conclusion of the Longhorn Startup Lab, students will be able to:
● Use the Lean Startup Canvas to validate startup ideas and to “de-risk” them. ● Create and implement a minimum viable product (MVP). ● Pitch their startups in writing or verbally in a sentence, two-minute, and six-minute versions. ● Sell business concepts confidently and succinctly with A/V decks to audiences of customers and/or investors. ● Form a startup entity and establish its ownership and governance. ● Operate a startup using regular meetings and written personal updates. ● Contribute in a team setting to plan, lead, organize, and control technical product development. ● Learn what to expect as the business scales in terms of operational, personnel, and other requirements.
How Will Longhorn Startup Feel?
Here are some of the questions we hope to help you answer: How do you validate your big idea for meeting a market need? What does it mean for a startup to “pivot?” How big does your idea have to be to justify your time and attract any outside investment? How will you assess the competition? How do you sell the idea to people you need on the team? Whom can you trust? Will you hire or recruit your team? Will everybody be paid the same? Will anybody leave your company at any point? Are brothers-in-law good candidates for CFO? What is a CFO? Who will be CEO? How should you build your board of directors to govern your company? How much on-the-job training can you afford? Does your startup need a culture? Is honesty the best policy? Will there be parties? Should you have a President’s Club? How does the team change over time? What is the best way to organize and manage your company as it grows? Will you need adult supervision -- people who already know how to manage things? Will you eventually have to cave in and hire some salespeople? What is the difference between marketing and sales? How do you plan for the money you’ll need? What does a financial planning spreadsheet look like, with such elements as units, costs, prices, overhead, headcounts, expenses, cash, debt, capital equipment, receivables, and payables. How do you name your startup? How do you get traction with investors, if you need any? How much is your startup worth at various times? How many rounds of finance might you need and how do you structure them? How do you develop a go-to-market strategy with an initial product? How do you develop and test that first product? Yes, test? How do you position your startup and market it? How do you rename your company? How to find customers and sell to them? How do you structure strategic partnerships? How do you support and get follow-on orders from customers? How do you decide on your second product? What changes as you get bigger? Are you still having fun? How do you get liquidity for your shareholders, including employees with stock options? How much of the movie THE SOCIAL NETWORK or the TV show SILICON VALLEY should you believe and use to guide your startup? IPO or M&A or what? How do you become serial? Will you come back and be one of our mentors after your third IPO? If LSL works for you, will you someday donate a building to UT Austin? Stuff like that.
Among the personal skills we plan to teach are how to be healthy, speak, write, sell, and plan in the startup context. OK, here is the answer at the back of the book: listening.
At the end of the semester, we aim to have your startup viable, ready to raise money, defunct, or ready to apply for a commercial accelerator.
Lab Requirements and Policies
All teams will convene on Thursday evenings for team meetings and office hours with the mentors and instructors. All team members are required to attend and participate in all practicum evenings. Failure to attend or participate lowers your grade and reduces your ability to contribute effectively to the team. Additionally, students who leave early or arrive late will see a negative impact on their grade. During these evenings, the instructors and their guest mentors will meet one-on-one with each team for personalized advice and each team will get a chance to practice their elevator pitch in front of all of the class.
The typical class starts with each team giving a quick 5 minute updates that include: ● 2 minute elevator pitch ● 1 “Aha!” moment from the past week ● 1 “Oh no!” moment from the past week
After updates, we will break into teams and each mentor will meet with their team for at least 1 hour. The Instructors and TA will rotate through a short meeting with each team.
Teams are expected to meet between classes, including at least 1 hour per week on their own. Tuesday evenings from 6-7pm are reserved for that. Other times are encouraged.
Each team member will write a weekly 1-page “progress and priorities update” and distribute as email to team members, with copies to faculty advisors, mentors, TAs, and instructors. The purposes of these updates are reporting and collaboration. They will communicate what the team member accomplished last week and what his or her priorities are for next week in advancing the startup. The writing and content in these updates each week will be graded by a TA and by the team’s mentors. These and all written assignments are to be submitted prior to the prescribed deadlines by email to team members, mentors, faculty advisors, instructors, and the designated TA. Weekly updates must follow strict guidelines for formatting.
There may be periodic assignments related to lecture topics including watching videos, reading assignments, and exercises that will be submitted and graded.
Selected teams will demonstrate its product or service, even if only in prototype form, during Demo Day, usually the last day of class. This will be a graded presentation for the team with participation by all. There will be a rehearsal of the Demo Day pitch scheduled one or two weeks before Demo Day, also graded. Grades are based on the exposition of the idea and evidence of skills learned and not on the presumed viability of the idea, but it goes without saying that it’s much easier to give a rousing presentation or a good idea than a bad one. Teams that are not selected to present on stage will be graded based on their Dry Run presentation.
Oral reporting will occur via regular team and mentor meetings, practice pitch sessions, and two presentations for the semester – Rehearsal and Demo Day. Mentors will be asked to grade your participation and communication skills in the classroom setting and in their individual meetings with you.
Ownership
Various kinds of ownership are important machinery of Free Enterprise. Equity ownership of corporations formed by Longhorn Startup teams is an important matter to be confronted by the teams with guidance from their startup mentors and Longhorn Startup instructors. Any agreements as to ownership of a Longhorn Startup must be in writing – no oral promises real or imagined are allowed. U Texas will not own Longhorn Startups by virtue of their participation in the class. The instructors will not own or be in any way compensated by Longhorn Startups during their participation in Longhorn Startup. Longhorn Startup mentors will not take ownership in or be employed by Longhorn Startups during Longhorn Startup. Investors other than these may be sought at various times by Longhorn Startups, with the un-conflicted advice and assistance of these mentors and instructors.
Ownership of intellectual property (IP) by Longhorn Startup students, their teams, and faculty advisors (if any) is an important matter to be confronted by the teams with guidance from their startup mentors and Longhorn Startup instructors. In particular, Longhorn Startup will work with teams on any dealings with the UT Austin Office of Technology Commercialization (OTC). Participation in Longhorn Startup will not alter in any manner the startup’s ownership position in its IP.
Students should be aware that any information about business or product designs, plans, technology, or know-how that is revealed to anyone associated with the Longhorn Startup program, including other students, faculty, TA’s, mentors, and guests, is not protected by confidentiality agreements. Those who are intending to rely on patent or trade secret protections should consult their own legal counsel as to what they may safely disclose in the context of participating actively in the course and presenting their companies in public settings like Demo Day. Accordingly, students with companies developing in stealth mode are discouraged from enrolling in the course.
Course and Instructor Evaluations
Evaluations of the course and instructors will be conducted during and especially near the end of the semester.
Academic Dishonesty
The University of Texas Honor Code will be followed regarding academic dishonesty, which will not be tolerated.
Students with Disabilities
UTAustin provides academic accommodations for qualified students with disabilities. For such, call Services for Students with Disabilities (SSD) at 512-471-6259 (voice) or 816-329-3986 (video). Please notify LSL instructors or TAs as quickly as possible if material being presented is not accessible to you.
Behavior Concerns Advice Line
If you are worried about someone associated with our class who is acting oddly, you may use the Behavior Concerns Advice Line (BCAL) at 512-232-5050 or visit http://www.utexas.edu/safety/bcal.
Course Drops
By state law, the number of course drops for academic reasons is limited to six (6). What does this mean? Best you find out from your academic advisors when thinking about dropping this class. We will not be giving all students As, not even most students, neither can we give assurances about grades much in advance of the end of the course. If you absolutely must get an A, say to get into graduate school, you should probably not risk taking this class. If you commence the course as an individual or your team is not accepted by the instructor you must drop the class.
Communications Policy
Students are responsible for keeping the University informed as to changes in their email addresses. Students are expected to check email frequently enough, say daily, to stay current with University-related communications.
In addition, it is strongly advised that students join the Longhorn Startup Facebook groups in order to receive real-time information from the instructors and other relevant individuals. If you do not have a Facebook account you will need to create one in order to join the groups.
Emergency Evacuation Policy
You are required to evacuate and assemble outside University buildings when a fire alarm is activated or an announcement is made. Please familiarize yourself with all exit doors and get confident that you could exit promptly in an emergency.
Collaborative Practices
At any given time during the practicum, all team members should be fully engaged in practicum activities, including preparation of written and oral reports. Tasks should be assigned to team members evenly, but in a way that capitalizes on individual strengths and experience. If your strengths lie in particular project areas (for example, planning, proposing, researching, implementing, managing, coordinating, communicating, researching, and so on), then put your energies into those areas. However, that does not absolve you of responsibilities in other areas, or of understanding what’s happening in those areas.
Longhorn Startup Lab Grading
This class is graded according to the requirements previously described with the following weightings:
Instructor TA Mentor Peer Total
Weekly Updates 10% 10% 5% 20% 45%
Assignments 10% 10% Demo Day Practice 15% 5% 20%
Demo Day Final 10% 5% 15%
Attendance 10% 10%
Total 35% 30% 15% 20% 100%
Peer Assessment
To help you assess your performance as a team member, all members will be asked to evaluate each other’s performance as team members. The practicum instructors will use these peer assessments to give credit to team members who make outstanding team contributions or to deny credit to students who make little or no contributions.
Attendance
This is an experience-based learning environment so you only get the benefit if you attend the class. A significant portion of your grade is based on your attendance and participation. Arriving late and leaving early will have a negative impact.
Please let the instructor and TA know promptly if there is any problem that is preventing you from performing satisfactorily in the class. Do not delay in reporting your problems, so we can fix them before much damage is done.
Date of Final Exam
There is no final exam. Teams will present their startups at Demo Day, which will occur no later than the last day of class. Demo Day is the finale of this class. It will be open to the public and we expect there to be hundreds of attendees, including professional investors.
Mentor Background Checks
All class mentors are required to pass the University’s standard Criminal Background Check, per this policy:
Handbook of Operating Procedures 5-1140 Criminal Background Checks
I. Policy Statement It is the policy of The University of Texas at Austin (“University”) to conduct criminal background checks as authorized by federal and state law and The University of Texas System (“UT System”) policies. This policy also requires an employee and other individuals covered by this policy to report any subsequent criminal convictions, excluding misdemeanor offenses punishable only by a fine, as specified in this policy. (Refer to Sec. VII.I –Self Reporting).
II. Reason for Policy To promote the University’s commitment to a safe and secure environment by providing guidance for conducting and using criminal background checks in compliance with federal and state laws and UT System policies.
III. Scope & Audience This policy applies to all University employees, including individuals in positions requiring student status. This policy also applies to final applicants to University positions, interns, volunteers, affiliated workers, contingent workers, students in programs with assignments in clinical health care, and in certain circumstances, contractors and their employees.
IV. Definitions (specific to this policy) University Affiliate: an individual who has a relationship with the University outside of traditional employment. They can be paid or unpaid and include but are not limited to affiliate relationships associated with research, visiting scholars, employees of contractors, interns, contingent workers, students in programs with assignments in clinical health care, and volunteers. A more complete listing may be found on the Human Resources website.
Note to Mentors on Background Checks:
Criminal history only poses a problem if it is considered recent and relevant (as defined here) to the relationship you hold with the university. The central HR office has a small group of staff that is authorized to view the results of a background check, and no one at a school or department level can see that information. The most obvious offenses that would be a problem are: theft, injury to person(s) and/or property, weapons, and threats.
We will submit your name to our administrative contact, who will generate a simple online form for you to complete. HR then runs the check and sends confirmation.