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Technology innovation, entrepreneurship and commercialization.

From Idea to Impact

MIN-Corps is the University of Minnesota hub for technology innovation, entrepreneurship and commercialization.

We provide education and coaching programs that help STEM students, postdocs and faculty develop the skills required to translate innovations into product and services with real-world impact.

MIN-Corps is a joint effort of the Technological Leadership Institute in the College of Science and Engineering, the Holmes Center for Entrepreneurship in the Carlson School of Management, and Technology Commercialization office in the Office for the Vice President for Research.

We are a partner institution in the NSF I-Corps Great Lakes Region Hub.

MIN-Corps Results

Since 2014, 4500+ participants from 22 colleges within University of Minnesota and across the business community have participated in more than 100 MIN-Corps academic courses, commercialization bootcamps, value proposition design workshops, seminars and events. The 425+ innovation teams (including 31 startups) have generated about $37 million in commercialization grants and investment funding. Special congratulations to BlueCube Bio (grand prize winner of the 2020 MN Cup venture competition) and Counterflow Technologies (runner up in 2020 MN Cup). In addition, MIN-Corps has successfully nominated 33 teams to the national NSF I-Corps Teams program, with each team receiving a $25,000-$50,000 grant to engage in intense customer discovery and business model design. For more information about the University of Minnesota's participants in NSF I-Corps Teams cohorts, click here.

The I-Corps National Teams Experience

Participating in the NSF I-Corps National Teams program is seven intense weeks of exhaustion, exhilaration and "ah-ha" moments. Each participating team emerges with a robust set of customer discovery and technology commercialization skills, as well as an assessment of their innovation's market potential and business model. University of Minnesota teams that have completed MIN-Corps program customer discovery requirements are eligible to be recommended to the National Teams program.

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"The class helped us organize our thoughts, come up with hypotheses, and go out there and test the waters. Even though we are at a very [early] stage of commercialization, we have a much clearer vision of where we need to go next."

"I found all the concepts to be incredibly valuable. I wish I would have been more familiar with this approach years ago. This has, and will continue to, shape the way I do work."

"I thought the class time to together with [the instructors’] leadership as well as the sharing of experiences was a great learning experience. The course materials and out-of-class activities were a great foundation."

"The MIN-CORPS class helped us organize our thoughts, come up with hypotheses, and go out there and test the waters. Even though we are at a very [early] stage of commercialization, we have a much clearer vision of where we need to go next."

Women Innovators Conference

Webinars

Interactive Workshops

Upcoming Events

Minnesota Crucible Prize

StartUp: Customer Development and Testing - Spring Semester 2022

Tulane Business Model Competition

Minnesota SBIR/STTR Accelerator - NIH Cohort

NSF I-Corps: From Lab to Impact

Technology innovation, entrepreneurship and commercialization.

From Idea to Impact

MIN-Corps Results

The I-Corps National Teams Experience