The State of Startups: A Student Perspective

abstract: This thesis will bring together students to engage in entrepreneurship by finding, measuring and sharing strategic market opportunities. From a student’s perspective, it will take a deep dive into the world of startup ecosystems, markets and trends utilizing both qualitative and quantitative market research techniques. The information gathered has been curated into a productive, meaningful manner, through a report titled “The State of Startups: A Student Perspective.� The first key theme of this thesis is that market intelligence can be a powerful tool. The second key theme is the power of knowledge implementation towards competitive strategies. The first section of the thesis will focus on identifying and understanding the current “startup� landscape as a basis on which to build strategic and impactful business decisions. This will be accomplished as the team conducts a landscape analysis focused on the student perspective of the student-based North American “entrepreneurial� ecosystem. The second section of the thesis will focus specifically on the personal experiences of student startup founders. This will be accomplished through the analysis of interviews with founders of the startups researched from the first section of the thesis. This will provide us with a direct insight into the student perspective of the student-based North American “entrepreneurial� ecosystem. (abstract