The Trione Student Venture Fund was endowed by a gift from Victor Trione, MBA 70, and provides a prize package that includes $5,000 to enable experiential learning to 20 early-stage student startups each year. The Sega Sammy Fund for New Media was endowed by a gift from Sega Sammy and provides $5,000 awards to four student startups annually that are focused on ventures such as entertainment, gaming, or new technology. The experiential learning awards are intended for use in prototype development and customer discovery activities. These awards provide a unique opportunity for high risk, high reward projects that best embody the Berkeley Haas Defining Principle to Question The Status Quo.

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Requirements

As a leader in the greater UC Berkeley entrepreneurship ecosystem, Berkeley Haas will grant special consideration to cross-disciplinary projects involving team members from other UC Berkeley campus departments. Teams must have at least one current Berkeley Haas student (MBA or undergrad). Faculty, staff, and external partners may only play an advisory role.

Grantees will post a 60-90 second “lessons learned” for public viewing as well as a single paragraph written status report due six months after the end of the award. The teams must also agree to respond to brief bi-annual surveys for two years post-award.

International founders are subject to mandatory tax withholding. Having a US-based Haas student on the team will simplify the award process.

Process

Ten $5,000 student experiential awards will be granted in December and the other ten in May.

Important Note: You will be required to create a Startup Profile and account on BearX in order to access the application. This requires you to use your berkeley.edu email address. 

Applicants must submit general information plus a single-page Executive Summary containing the following elements: problem, solution, market overview, customer interview results (number of interviews and summary conclusions), team (names and current UCB student affiliations) as well as the use of funds.

If the startup results from classwork, a single page Faculty recommendation will also be required.

Awardees will be selected by a committee comprised of Faculty and Institute for Business Innovation leadership along with investors and leaders from the Berkeley entrepreneurship ecosystem.

Reminder: the grants are non-dilutive, with no equity required.

Awards are a one-time contribution. Awardees can apply again for other student experiential learning ventures, but not for the same venture.

Judging Criteria

Problem Definition

Target audience clearly defined or a clear plan to gather data for refining.

Potential for Impact

Addresses a pressing & important problem, clear linkage between problem and proposed solution.

Viability

Skill sets/composition of current team can achieve initial objectives. Use of funds can significantly advance and/or de-risk project.

Quality

Team clearly put effort into defining a problem/solution and next steps. This is an idea/project worth funding.

Diversity of the Team

Is it a multidisciplinary team?

Frequently Asked Questions

Past Recipients

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