The Lassonde Entrepreneur Institute FY 2025 Annual Report is now available (see link below). We’re excited to tell everyone about developments from our program ranked among the top-10 for entrepreneurship by U.S. News & World Report and the Princeton Review. In the last year, we have worked with 5,300 college students, 711 high school outreach […]
Something big is coming for rising high school entrepreneurs starting summer 2026. The Lassonde Entrepreneur Institute – a top-10-ranked, interdisciplinary division of the University of Utah’s David Eccles School of Business – is introducing the Lassonde Startup Academy, a unique, pre-college, summer program for aspiring business founders, makers, creators and doers. The Academy will allow […]
It’s long been assumed that a lack of funding is what prevents startups from launching or founders from even testing their ideas in the first place. That’s the idea Victor Bennett, professor in the Department of Entrepreneurship & Strategy at the University of Utah’s David Eccles School of Business, was operating with. A startup owner […]
Scott Holley, a University of Utah alumnus, entrepreneur, and business executive, has joined the Lassonde Entrepreneurship Institute as its new executive director. Holley has vast experience in the world of entrepreneurship, particularly in cross-border manufacturing, consumer-branded products, and entrepreneurship through acquisition. Now, taking the helm on Lassonde’s 25th anniversary year, Holley has big plans. Sustaining […]
For speech-language pathologists (SLPs), performing accurate language assessments is crucial, but it’s also time-consuming. To tackle this problem, Levi Wilson, an entrepreneur from Utah, founded MISL.AI, an AI-powered platform designed to streamline the assessment process. MISL.AI merges powerful artificial intelligence with an academic framework called the Monitoring Indicators of Scholarly Language (MISL), developed by Sandi […]
Welcome to the Lassonde Startup Academy, a pre-college program for entrepreneurs, makers, builders, and doers provided by the Lassonde Entrepreneur Institute, a top-10 ranked program at the University of Utah. All high school students (ages 14-18) are welcome to enroll in this hands-on program to live, create, launch together. Live upstairs at Lassonde Studios, a […]
Here are the photos from events and activities at Lassonde Studios in September 2025. During this month, we attended workshops, pitched for Get Seeded grants, learned new skills at Make It activities, hosted our first entrepreneurship summit, and more. Find upcoming events here: lassonde.utah.edu/calendar.
Registration for the 2025-26 Tim Draper High School Utah Entrepreneur Challenge is now open. The statewide business-idea competition is open to all students in Utah ages 14-18. Teams compete for $30,000 in cash and scholarships. The registration deadline is Jan. 14, 2026. The competition is managed by the Lassonde Entrepreneur Institute — a top-10 ranked, […]
Registration for the 2025-26 Tim Draper Utah Entrepreneur Challenge is now open. All college students in Utah from participating colleges and universities are welcome to enter this statewide business-model competition. Teams are competing for $75,000 in cash and prizes this year. The registration deadline is Feb. 19, 2026. The Tim Draper Utah Entrepreneur Challenge is […]
Leonard Black will be remembered as an early advocate for student entrepreneurs at the University of Utah. He passed on Aug. 16, 2025, at the age of 83. During his time working at the University of Utah from 1999 to 2014, Black taught at the David Eccles School of Business and played a supporting role […]
