A helping hand for founders: from the initial idea to business success

We’ve made it our business to help your business get off to a successful start.

We can advise you on the start-up process and funding opportunities, open doors in the start-up community and provide you with state-of-the-art office infrastructure. The university supports start-ups with the Founders Lab, and the Creative Pre-Incubator programme

Give your imagination free rein

Our start-up services are designed to create a secure environment in which you can try out your business ideas.

It’s no coincidence that an above-average proportion of our graduates – between 6% and 8% – work as freelancers or are self-employed. Compared with the national average of 2%, this goes to show that with an IMC Krems education, you’ll be especially well prepared if you want to go freelance or start your own business.

Student standing in front of a poster with the inscription ‘IMC. It's all in me.’

No prior knowledge? No problem – we're here to support you!

Our services are aimed at students, alumni, and the IMC team. We offer consultation and support programmes, and we have relationships with companies in a wide range of sectors that might be interested in your business idea. Let us put you in touch.

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Founders Lab

The Founders Lab: a playground for business ideas

Our students come up with some great ideas. Many of them have the potential to be developed into successful business models.

The first step towards founding your start-up: Playground Ideation

Playground Ideation takes place twice a year and is an opportunity to workshop ideas (including business proposals) in collaboration with about 30 other students. It’s an exciting experience, especially if you don’t have a specific concept in mind at the start of the process – because during the weekend the ideas start to flow!

As a group, we hone in on the best approaches, and you get valuable feedback from your peers and our start-up experts. We work on the product and on defining the target groups for potential customers. The aim is to plan your start-up as effectively as possible on paper.

Afterwards, you continue the development work on your own. It goes without saying that you can call on us at any stage if you require additional support. On Demo Day you present your start-up idea to a larger audience and an independent panel, who’ll give you feedback.

Apply for Playground Ideation!

We’re looking for students from all departments who

want to develop new ideas and businesses, and/or
continue working on an existing business idea

Send us your application, telling us in your own words why you’d like to participate.

Find out more and apply today

Creative Pre-Incubator

What to expect

Through this comprehensive programme, we offer support to people who want to see their business ideas through to fruition. Let us provide you with the help you need to transform your project into a successful business.

Our experts know how it’s done and will be there to support you every step of the way – from obtaining funding and finding an accountant through to identifying companies that might be interested in your idea.

Find out more

Advice and guidance

We let you know whether it makes sense to patent your idea, and offer business pitch training and coaching.

Support

You’ll learn how to put together financial and business plans specifically tailored to your idea.

Coaching

A selection of our workshops: Business modelling, market research, intellectual property rights, marketing or venture capital.

Creating a buzz

We’ll introduce you to the start-up scene as well as to our CPI teams so you can exchange notes and get to know potential investors and business angels.