Academic Entrepreneurship

Utrecht University is convinced that in modern society, people increasingly need an entrepreneurial attitude and that universities will be playing a bigger role in the transfer of academic knowledge into everyday practice. To contribute to this development, the Utrecht University School of Economics has set up the Centre for Entrepreneurship (CfE).

By ‘academic entrepreneurship’ we mean the starting up and running of businesses that:

• develop products and/or services based on academic research; and/or
• use academic insight to support entrepreneurial endeavours.

The CfE does not limit itself to the starting and running of businesses, but also looks at entrepreneurship in the broadest sense: the discovery and creation of added value by developing ideas, researching opportunities and executing the necessary steps to realise those ideas.

Mission

The CfE’s mission is to provide education in this field to all students of Utrecht University, to offer practical support for academic entrepreneurship and to do research into entrepreneurship. These three components are interdependent and enforce each other. 
The CfE’s objective is to stimulate an entrepreneurial attitude in students, lecturers, researchers, support staff and in employers and employees in general. The CfE aims to achieve this  by applying academic knowledge to offer a solid approach in the development and evaluation of its activities, in cooperation with regional partners.

Strategy

The CfE aims to distinguish itself from other centres of entrepreneurship by focussing on:

• academic entrepreneurship;
• international entrepreneurship;
• the development of an entrepreneurial attitude in people and organisations; and
• stimulating entrepreneurship in companies throughout their entire life cycle.