SOUTHFIELD – The application deadline is Feb. 4 for the next nine-week Michigan I-Corps@LTU program that helps designers, innovators, engineers and tinkerers move their business ideas from the drawing board to the marketplace. classes start Feb. 14 at Lawrence Technological University.
This year?s program will emphasize Design Thinking, a product development process that goes through five steps: empathize, define, ideate, prototype and test. There is a focus on gaining customer input before fully commercializing a product.
The program also employs the Business Model Canvas, which provides a visual method for describing a firm?s value proposition, infrastructure, customers and finances.
The Michigan I-Corps@LTU program is available free of charge to qualified teams thanks to funding from the Coleman Foundation and support provided by the Lawrence Technological University Collaboratory and the University of Michigan Center for Entrepreneurship I-Corps Program.
Last year the LTU Collaboratory launched this real-world, results-oriented mentoring program to help students, faculty, alumni, innovators, entrepreneurs and companies advance new product ideas and establish new business opportunities.
Michigan I-Corps@LTU was established with funds from the Coleman Foundation and the Kern Family Foundation and is part of a statewide program designed to foster and grow an innovation ecosystem throughout Michigan. It provides participants with knowledge about what it takes to successfully commercialize their ideas and focus on meeting customer needs.
I-Corps participants are matched up with an industry mentor for individual assistance. Teams receive a prototyping stipend and can qualify for additional seed funding. The best team will receive a $1,000 cash prize.
?The program is designed to save years and money by developing a structured business model,? said Mark Brucki, executive director of economic development and government relations at Lawrence Tech. ?Each innovation team will develop a greater understanding of its product and how it can benefit customers, locate customers and markets, and discover what it takes to commercialize a product and overcome the barriers to adoption.?
For more information and to apply, Click on LTU.Edu/i-corps
