Business Development and Entrepreneurship

Only through passionate entrepreneurship and ground-breaking innovation can our economy thrive and our society tackle its pressing problems. We need leaders who can recognize and develop winning innovative solutions and implement them in new and existing businesses. Will you become such a leader?

In our programme, you learn how entrepreneurship contributes to our economy at all levels, how to boost entrepreneurship - both in new ventures as well as in existing organisations -, what it takes to become an entrepreneur yourself, how to finance new ventures and innovations, and how you can develop, validate and market innovations through business development processes.
Our teaching is interactive and action-based, with a strong foundation in science. Economic and management theories are combined with practical experiential learning. We foster your critical and creative thinking, improve your ability to make decisions under uncertainty, and enhance your interpersonal and practical skillset.

The real world perspective

The Utrecht University School of Economics (U.S.E.) aims to contribute to an economy where people flourish. We enrich economics with other disciplines to better solve problems and identify opportunities, from a business and a government point of view. Scientifically rigorous and societally relevant. The real world perspective.

Research Expertise

This Master’s programme is based on Utrecht University’s world class research in the domain of entrepreneurship, business development and innovation, and the interaction with business strategy and policy practice by U.S.E. staff members and lecturers. The programme also draws upon the broad international research and teaching network of the  Utrecht University Centre for Entrepreneurship, the Utrecht University Social Entrepreneurship Initiative, the Sustainable Finance Lab and various local and international networks. Incubators (e.g., UtrechtInc.) and local partners and companies actively contribute to the Master's programme and its courses.

Impactful new businesses, with ground-breaking innovations, promoting sustainable economic growth and a better future… our conviction is that all of that starts with the entrepreneurial mindset.

Content of the programme

In the Master's programme in Business Development and Entrepreneurship you focus on:

• Boosting entrepreneurial behavior and formulating strategy, both in the context of new ventures, as well as existing organizations;
• Applying rigorous scientific methods in your own academic research as well as in consulting projects with real companies;
• Developing and validating new venture ideas and business propositions;
• Creating the right ecosystem environment for new ventures and innovative businesses to thrive in;
• Applying entrepreneurial marketing methods, such as co-creation with customers and design thinking;
• Planning how to finance new ventures, innovation and business development projects.

Programme objectives

The Master’s programme in Business Development and Entrepreneurship provides you with:

• the tools, skills and techniques to recognise and develop new opportunities within established organisations as well as start-ups;
• market analysis and empirical techniques, including customer development and business insights;
• strategy creation abilities. Special attention is paid to formulating and validation new value propositions;
• competences for organising and managing fast-growing corporations and corporate units, internally as well as in value-creating networks;
• consulting skills highly sought after by today’s labor market;
• knowledge of how to finance new ventures and corporate innovation initiatives.

Career prospects

Graduates from this programme stand out from other job candidates by their mastery of the entrepreneurial mindset and their ability to explore impactful new business opportunities in new ventures and in existing organisations. Your expertise will be highly sought after in business development functions (including innovation, marketing and finance) consultancy  as well as in large (multinational) corporations. Your skillset will make you better equipped to start your own business and to help entrepreneurial teams start-up, and entrepreneurial contexts to flourish.

Admission

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