Imagine trying to win the lottery by picking the same number the last person won with. This is not far from how some people have approached starting a company: by basing their business model on old case studies. The early life of a startup is almost always unique and rather chaotic, making it difficult to apply static knowledge to an uncertain environment.Embracing this reality, the Imperial College of London with help from SynbiCITE and SynBioBeta is launching a brand new programme, called The Lean Launchpad for Seed-Stage SynBio Companies, to assist hopeful entrepreneurs along the chaotic path to success. Stephen Chambers, CEO of SynbiCITE, explains, “for the first time the highly successful Lean Launchpad programme, which has been taught at Stanford, Berkeley, Columbia, Caltech, and used by the U.S. NIH as part of its I-Corp curriculum, has been adapted specifically to address the commercialization of synthetic biology products and services.” From speaking with Stephen, it was clear he and his team are very excited to bring such a promising opportunity to student entrepreneurs and newly formed start-ups in the synthetic biology community.

About Lean LaunchPad

The Lean Lanchpad programme is an intensive, 12-week long course for teams interested in commercializing their synthetic biology related technology. Anything but conventional, the programme promises a much more dynamic, hands-on training experience designed to recreate “the pressures and demands of the real world in an early stage startup,” as Stephen described.In essence the programme will function as follows: Teams, usually of three, apply for a limited number of spaces. They are selected based on their “business model canvas” which clarifies the company’s position in the market by analyzing attributes like their necessary resources and customers’ needs. Taking this as a launching point, the programme focuses on developing their business by bringing the teams out of the classroom to gather information from real customers and modify their strategy from those interactions. Stephen remarked, “the programme focuses on the critical importance of customer discovery and development as well as market validation,” as tools to improve the relevance and desirability of the team’s product.Stephen Chambers went on to clarify, “Conventional wisdom is that entrepreneurship cannot be taught, and that an innate ability and serendipity are the leading factors in creating a successful business. It is very difficult to argue that these factors do not play a role in the unpredictable environment in which most startups operate. What is not in doubt is that possessing the skills and experience gained from starting your own business greatly increases the likelihood of further success.” That is why his course focuses on creating “the entrepreneurial experience of an early stage startup,” so that each team will garner the experience and wisdom from actually starting a business.Although out-of-classroom activities are the focus of the programme, the course also includes interactive lectures covering vital business basics, presentations designed to cultivate useful feedback, weekly meetings with experts in the field, and even a five-day networking trip to San Francisco. Both at the launch of the program and during the San Francisco trip, the teams will get a chance to interact with Steve Blank (image, right), founder of the Lean LaunchPad program, and a man recognized by Forbes as one of the 30 most influential people in Tech. Seeing his program grow internationally and into a new field Steve acknowledged, “it's exciting to be applying the Lean LaunchPad methodology to the area of synthetic biology. I'm really pleased to be working with Imperial College to help them with their commercialization efforts.”

Preparing for the 2015 Class and Beyond

From a large batch of applicants, 10 teams have already been selected for the 2015 course. The program begins later this month and already Stephen and his colleagues are very excited about what a wonderful opportunity this is for the industry in the UK to grow and move forward and can’t wait to work with their exemplary first cohort. “We have teams looking to commercialise some amazing products. They range from beautyceuticals, nutraceuticals, biosensors, biomaterials, biomachines and synthetic biology tools and software Apps,” Stephen remarked, demonstrating his excitement in combining an amazing program with the promising field of synthetic biology.Kate Wildauer of SynBioBeta is the program manager of this course at Imperial and encourages others to contact her if they are interested in bringing Lean LaunchPad to their organization. She explained that, “as an educator with both a business and a science background, I think it’s a fantastic application of the scientific method to entrepreneurship. There is a tremendous potential for utilizing this methodology to more effectively grow future businesses,” and she hopes the success of The Lean Launchpad for Seed-Stage SynBio Companies will help take the power of synthetic biology from the lab to the marketplace.