‘Takeoff to become a global entrepreneur’…The 1st class of Unicorn Express finished successfully…

The 1st class of ‘Unicorn Express’ hosted by Korea University Business School (Dean=Sangyong Kim) Startup Station (Head=Hojung Shin) and supervised by Korea University LINC3.0 Enterprise organization (Manager= Kwanyoung Lee) finished successfully with many accomplishments.

Unicorn Express, which opened for the first time this year, was designed to support the global capabilities of KU startups and those going overseas. The program also aimed to teach global entrepreneurship to outstanding pre-entrepreneurs (undergraduates) as part of the ‘Leaders in Industry-university Cooperation Part 3 (LINC 3.0)’ program. Also, it had a mentoring program to educate entrepreneurs by pairing 10 startups to 10 pre-entrepreneurs (undergraduates) one by one.

10 startups that participated in the 1st class of Unicorn Express were selected by early startups from KUBS Startup Station and Anam Campus Town. The selected startups went through systematic education through mock global IR (investor relations). Also, pre-entrepreneurs were selected through fierce startup competitions, indicating that 41 teams participated in the preliminary rounds. The program then selected 10 undergraduates among the 12 teams which made it to the final rounds. These pre-entrepreneurs were paired with selected companies to learn startup know-how in the field. Also, they visited the United States from the 6th to the 11th of January to strengthen global startup capabilities along with participating in lectures from Silicon Valley entrepreneurs and Startup Summit programs.

On the first two days, the 1st class of Unicorn Express went through expert mentoring like English speech and peer group mentoring based on their mock IR experience. On Day 3, they visited Silicon Valley known as the heart of US startups for entrepreneurship lectures from global enterprises like Apple, Google, and HP.

On Day 4, they participated in the ’82 Startup Summit’ event. 82 Startup is a meeting for Korean entrepreneurs and investors in the United States or aiming to enter the US market. 82 Startup Summit is the biggest event for Korean entrepreneurs can get lectures from global startup founders and investors along with building a network with them. In this 82 Startup Summit, NC Soft CEO SongEi Yoon, SendBird CEO Dongshin Kim, and ZEPETO CEO Jay Lee joined as lecturers to discover the future industry of the global market and insight into the new market area.

On Day 5, the class invited VC(Venture Captial) and CVC(corporate venture capital) experts from Silicon Valley to hold a special lecture. The lecturer is ‘Mitchell Weinstock’ from ‘HP Tech Ventures’, which is a CVC under the global IT enterprise HP and gave a lecture on the theme of ‘Strategic Investing working with Corporate Venture Capital’.

On the last Day 6, the class went through investment and feedback on examples of success and failure, market entering strategy, and implications of global enterprises with a similar business model. The first class of Unicorn Express was able to strengthen their global startup capabilities through activities like global venture capital and accelerator expert lectures, building networks with global enterprises, and research on the global leading model. Pre-entrepreneur Heecheol Jung (Business 20’) who participated in this class of Unicorn Express said “It was a meaningful experience for me to visit Silicon Valley with a dream of starting a global startup as a KUBS student.” Also, he said “It was impressive to get real advice from the lectures in the startup session including ’82 Startup’.

KUBS Startup Station will keep working on joint business so that pre-entrepreneurs and oversea venture investors and oversea mentors can exchange-cooperate with each other all the time. In addition, the Unicorn Express class will also be hosted every year.