FAQ 2022 Edition: Your top 10 burning questions, answered.
Ready to take the next step in your venture building journey? Applications are currently open for our fall cohorts of Venture Founder CORE and Lab2Launch! In anticipation, we wanted to share the top 10 questions we receive from applicants to demystify the experience and get you ready to transform your idea or innovation into impact with entrepreneurship@UBC.
Is your question missing?
Attend our upcoming events to ask our team your burning questions in real time! RSVP for our June 15 Community Town Hall to meet founders in our community and our June 23 Info Session and AMA (Ask Me Anything) to meet our Stream and Studio Leads.
Review our Q&A below.
Q: Does a venture require a full team to apply to Venture Founder?
A: Preference is given to teams with 2 individuals who are motivated, open to feedback and have a diverse skill set (example, a business person and technical person). A full team is not required and building a team is part of your journey with entrepreneurship@UBC.
Q: Do all participants have to be from UBC?
A: To join our programs, only 1 member of the team requires a UBC affiliation. They can be a UBC staff or faculty member, student or recent alumni within 5 years of graduation.
Q: Does the program cost money?
A: entrepreneurship@UBC is a program funded by the university and generous external partners and as such, is offered at no cost to participants. Learn more about our funders who help make this a reality.
Q: Where is the program located?
A: The Fall 2022 cohort will be a hybrid model, mostly running online with some in-person sessions on UBC Point Grey Campus. In between sessions, ventures in our community can frequent our spaces across UBC Point Grey and Robson Square leveraging our hot desking and meeting rooms to work on your venture, meet with your team and take meetings with mentors. View our locations.
Q: What is the difference between CORE and Lab2Launch?
A: CORE and Lab2Launch are the two streams under ‘Venture Founder’. CORE works with entrepreneurs and innovators working across industries on a tech or business model innovation. Ventures in CORE are working in a range of areas including hardware, software, consumer packaged goods and technology applications ranging from AI and robotics to agritech, fintech, edtech, gaming, and many others.
Lab2Launch supports UBC researchers and scientists who plan to build, or are building, a deep tech venture based on a proprietary and novel scientific or technological innovation. Ventures in Lab2Launch span industries, but are similar in that they are based upon a research innovation or discovery.
Q: What is a Venture Studio? How does a team apply to a Venture Studio?
A: entrepreneurship@UBC’s Climate, Human Health and Social Venture Studios offer teams in our community additional programming, community and mentorship within these respective verticals. A separate application to a Venture Studio is not required. Ventures who identify within these verticals can participate in Studio activities upon their acceptance to CORE or Lab2Launch. Learn more about the Studios.
Q: How long does the program take to complete? What does it cover?
A: CORE and Lab2Launch both run for 16 sessions, running independently for sessions 1-10, then joining for sessions 11-16. Sessions cover a variety of topics under the framework of ‘foundations’, ‘discovery’ and ‘operations’, including, but not limited to, customer discovery, market validation, telling your story/pitching, company governance and much more!
Q: Who are your mentors? How does mentorship pairing work?
A: We are privileged to work with 250+ mentors across the Vancouver and BC innovation ecosystem who invest their time, expertise and insights into our venture community. Each cohort, anywhere between 15-30 volunteer mentors work closely with entrepreneurs throughout the sessions to help advise on and achieve your goals, leveraging their own experience.
For the first several sessions, mentors work will all venture teams. Halfway through the program, mentor and venture pairings will be assigned based on the venture and mentor preferences. Learn more about our Mentor Network
Q: What is the 4 T’s Playbook?
A: The 4 T’s: Team, Tech, Treasury and Traction, is our ‘playbook’ recognizing that the venture journey is varied. This methodology embodies venture-centric thinking, providing entrepreneurs with an objective, goal-based framework, ensuring that accountability, equity, diversity and inclusion are at the heart of our engagement with you. Learn more about the 4 T’s and how it relates to CORE here and Lab2Launch here
Q: Can I apply to go directly into HATCH Venture Builder?
A: The HATCH Venture Builder is a collaborative initiative between entrepreneurship@UBC and the Institute for Computing Information and Cognitive Systems (ICICS). HATCH is for teams who have completed Venture Founder and are ready to scale, unlocking additional resources including dedicated Entrepreneurs in Residence, access to over 10,000+ square feet of office and maker space within ICICS and Robson Square, curated venture training, workshops and networking events and more. To learn more, see here. Applications for HATCH open internally for ventures part of our community twice a year in the spring and winter seasons.
Ready to get started? Apply for Venture Founder today!
Applications close June 30