We offer you a great network of experienced and dedicated coaches. We will introduce you to all coaches and strongly recommend that you apply to one of them afterwards. You will probably meet your coach (virtually or locally) once a week.

No problem! We simply network you with a team with an idea. Another alternative are our “sponsored ideas”: Our industrial partners regularly tell us about problems they encounter in their day-to-day business, which we then develop into sketches of ideas. The advantage? With each predefined idea of our partners, you automatically receive a mentor from the company.

Great. Tell us as much as possible about it in your application! All ideas we work on at the Academy should have what it takes to become Unicorn. Pitch your  idea to Tim & Hannes (Startup Lab & Corporate Lab). Our bar is high: we are looking for innovations that create real value and digitalize the everyday life of our users in a sustainable way. We favour B2B business models and want to see real market potential! We don’t bake small rolls. Our goal is at least tenfold growth!

Sometimes business ideas don’t work as planned. Don’t panic! This is normal and absolutely no reason to give up! Be open, accept the feedback, work with it, rethink. If your original business idea still leads you into a dead end, we will evaluate the situation together, discuss new solutions or redefine the idea. Don’t worry. This is quite normal in the life of a founder!

Between the workshops, the focus is on implementing what has been learned. You have to organize yourself in your team: When do you meet? How do you exchange data? Who takes over which tasks? You have to apply the findings from the workshop weekends and Meetups to validate your idea! Interviews, conversations, surveys … that is, roll up your sleeves and get started! And best – we offer you & your team a nice working place at our new CampusLab.

The workshop weekends will be led by Tim (Startup Lab). In the workshops, he and his team explain methods to help you validate your business idea. After the event, we will send you Tim’s presentation and a list of “homework” that you and your team will work on until the next meetings. Step by step you gain data. They flow into a startup presentation – a pitch deck – which you then present on our stage on the final day – the Graduation Day.

The Graduation Day is the closing event of the Empower2Build program. Before you go on stage for your final pitch, we’ll make sure you’re ready and have a convincing pitch deck. We’ll invite our startup community and an expert jury will listen to you on stage that evening, evaluate your business case and your pitch and ask questions. The winner gets … well, let’s surprise you!

Yes, we will provide you with drinks, snacks and food. So there are no excuses not to participate.

It’s simple: It depends on you! Anything is possible!
We recommend that you talk to your team members before Pitch Day to clarify everyone’s expectations: Who is interested in what? Who wants to continue? Although we would like all participants to discover their Startup DNA, experience shows that not everyone wants to continue. If you want to continue, you can apply for membership in our Camps Lab. It includes 3 to 6 months of coworking, participation in workshops and individual mentoring.

We expect 100% attendance at the meetings. However, the actual work takes place between meetings and is just as important. Prepare yourself for eight intensive weeks, during which you should invest at least 1-2 hours a day for the idea and its validation.