The UGA Entrepreneurship Program provides students with hands-on opportunities, resources in the Innovation Gateway, as well as university-wide resources for on-campus startups, all in an effort to help launch successful business ventures:

UGA Idea Accelerator Program

The UGA Idea Accelerator Program, sponsored by UGA’s Entrepreneurship Program in partnership with UGA's Thinc Initiative and Four Athens, takes place twice a year in the fall and spring semesters. This 8-week "business boot camp" prepares students for the next step in their business development.

Students who are ready to start or expand their business are encouraged to apply to the UGA Idea Accelerator Program. The program provides students with a board of experienced, successful entrepreneurs, advisors, and investors that help student entrepreneurs grow revenues and profits, stay focused on the right strategic issue, and develop key contacts.

Participants receive honest, unfiltered advice and feedback, help with critical business decisions, and lasting results for their business. Students are held accountable to key performance indicators and receive real-world experiences from seasoned mentors and investors. The accepted companies will form a cohort to test ideas, discover their customers, develop their model, and compete for a final award of $5,000.

Teams will meet twice a week for an hour and a half over the course of 8 weeks. Students will be challenged and held accountable for developing their business throughout the entirety of the UGA Idea Accelerator Program.

The program is broken down in to 3 rounds with teams competing to move on to the next level.

• Weeks 1 - 4: Customer Discovery Process
• Weeks 5 & 6: Financial Literacy
• Weeks 7 & 8: Investor Readiness

Those who make it to the final round of the program will be given the opportunity to pitch their business plan to a panel of judges for a $5,000 award.

Apply to the UGA Idea Accelerator Program

Student Startup Incubator

The former design studio for the College of Environmental Design is being renovated into a student startup incubator space that will be used as an office space and co-working space for team collaboration. The Student Startup Incubator will host socials on home game Fridays to allow students and ENTR alumni to connect and gear up for the game.

• Student Startup Office Space
• Co-Working Space
• Presentation Space
• 11,00 sq ft.

UGA Kickstart Fund

The UGA Kickstart Fund is a privately funded program designed to provide seed grant funding to student and faculty startups. Companies receive grant amounts of between $1,000 and $5,000 in support of their company ideas. Companies submit a summary of their business and justification for the funding. Decisions on who and how much are made by an outside panel of entrepreneurs.