Stanford University launches UK-based course

The Stanford Ignite London course, to be run by the California institution’s Graduate School of Business, aims to bring the “Silicon Valley culture” to the UK, and is targeting British science, technology, engineering and mathematics entrepreneurs.

The 10-week course, which will cost $10,000 (£6,650), will be delivered by faculty members both in the US, who will give lectures remotely via the internet, and by several members of staff who will be resident in the UK. Classes will take place in Canary Wharf, where the institution will borrow lecture space from Infosys, an Indian technology firm.

The course will explain to entrepreneurs “the fundamentals of management and practical aspects of identifying and moving their venture forward”, a statement from the business school says.

Bethany Coates, assistant dean for global innovations programs at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, said Britain’s “rich history of science and innovation” made it “a natural choice for our new programme”.

“We hope that by marrying this with our well-known business acumen and Silicon Valley thinking, we can really help to develop nascent ventures and new lines of business within existing corporations,” she said.

Stanford has previously run Ignite programmes in a number of cities, including Bangalore and Beijing. The London programme will run from September to December this year, and is open for applications until May. The university says there is no target number for the course cohort, and that successful applicants will have to apply and then pass a face-to-face interview.  

For more information on the programme, and an in-depth podcast interview with Ms Coates, see Times Higher Education next week (19 March).

chris.parr@tesglobal.com