Originally Published: August 2013

In September 2012 I begun a masters degree in Technology Entrepreneurship at UCL. The degree is a hands on way of teaching you about creating, developing and growing a technology startup. The course encourages you to come with or create a startup and apply everything you learn throughout the course to that startup.

Throughout the course we had modules in the areas of:

• Entrepreneurial finance
• Customer development
• Business development
• Creativity within organisations
• Strategy for high growth companies
• Marketing and analytics

Some of the main things I learnt was to do with the Lean Startup methodology and the idea of constantly testing your ideas. The term MVP (Minimal Viable Product) gets thrown around a lot, but the principle of creating a small test of any idea is a great way to learn. “Fail fast, fail often” was another term that was used and debated a lot during the course.

The networking though was one of the best things about the course. Being based in London, which is such a fantastic tech and startup hub, our tutors showed us all of the meetups, competitions and hang outs that the capital has to offer. They were able to introduce us to dozens of investors and influencers in the scene, whilst the events UCL itself hosted expanded our networks even further.

During my time at UCL I joined the UCL Enterprise society as a Graphic Designer and very often as the guy who pitches our events and programmes to the rest of UCL.

When I joined the course my startup, Nine Studios, was looking at designing and selling smart home products, whilst consulting in product design at the same time. Clearly I was in need of this degree, as all I had were strange dreams in my head of what I wanted it to be. During the course I would end up pivoting my focus from selling smart home products to eventually designing and building our own range of digital photo frames.

During the course my startup ended up with:

• Winning the London Entrepreneurs Challenge
• Winning the Bright Ideas Award
• Shortlisted in the top 6 for Britains Top Real Role Model
• Shortlisted for the Shell LiveWIRE Grand Ideas Award
• Shortlisted for the NACUE Varsity Pitch Competition

I also gave a TEDx talk during TEDxUCL on the future of home design, which was my major research area on my undergraduate degree.

At the end of the degree I ended up with a great startup that I would continue developing and achieved a Merit grade for the actual university work.