Every year during Entrepreneurship Week, individuals and groups of University of Dundee students, staff and recent graduates have the opportunity to win funding that could kick-start a business that changes lives!

It is an opportunity to pitch your idea to our esteemed judges with years and even decades of experience in the business world. You do not have to be the most business-savvy or experienced person: all you have to come with is a clear business idea and the desire to take it forward. The University of Dundee Centre for Entrepreneurship can offer support and guidance that can take your idea to the next level. There is £31,000 up for grabs, as well as a spot on the 3-month summer cohort of Elevator’s Dundee Accelerator programme. Additionally, there will be two iPads awarded to the best pitches as voted by the public audience on the day.

The first stage is submitting an online application form. For this, you will have to decide what award you are applying for; this is dependent on your educational school if you are a current student. There are separate prize funds for the schools of Life Sciences (£2,500), Art and Design (£2,500), Science and Engineering (£5,000 – for this award you could be currently studying or have graduated in the last 5 years) and for all other schools there is the Student Award (£3,000). If you currently work at the university, there is £10,000 up for grabs and for recent graduates from the last 2 years (except for Science and Engineering which are the last 5 years), there is £3,000 funding for the taking.

Due to the nature of the competition, there are many opportunities for you to gain some funding for your business, including £5,000 discretionary funding for any business that the judges believe needs some extra help to get set off!

You have to hurry though because the applications close on Tuesday 4th of February! If you have any questions about the application, you can always email entrepreneurship@dundee.ac.uk. We are also open from 9am to 5pm every weekday so you can pop in and someone will help with your question.

So, let’s say you have submitted your application form by the 4th of February: then what? Fingers crossed that you have been chosen for Stage 2 – then you will be notified by the 7th of February and have 2 weeks (until the 20th of February) to send in your Stage 2 proposal form which must go into more detail than your first submission. Again, you have the opportunity to ask questions and we will host a workshop on the 13th of February to help you out.

You then submit your Stage 2 application, and, because of your hard work, research and dedication, you get invited to pitch at the Live Pitching Final and Prize-Giving, which will happen on Thursday 27th of February during Entrepreneurship week! Now what? Well, for starters, you will have 3 minutes (yes, only 3 minutes) to pitch your ideas using 5 PowerPoint slides (yes, only 5). This will be followed up by a 5-minute Q&A session by our external judging panel. All of the relevant files and forms including the judging criteria can be found at https://www.dundee.ac.uk/entrepreneurship/venture/

So, you have reached the end of this blog and you might feel you would like more time to develop a business idea – why not try the Enterprise Challenge? Applications have closed for this semester but will open again in September 2020 and if you win the challenge you will be shortlisted for the Venture Competition!

For those who are definitely applying for the Venture Competition: good luck and remember that our doors are always open!