Funding Opportunities

 

ZinnStarter

Student showing off the electronics inside his product.

ZinnStarter is a program that exists to ignite the next generation of entrepreneurs.

Criteria and Submission Requirements

About the UVU ZinnStarter Program

ZinnStarter’s mission is to:

  • Instill the next generation of entrepreneurs to create enduring businesses
  • Provide seed money for promising business plans
  • Provide students with Ray Zinn’s leadership, management and entrepreneurship knowledge

Ray Zinn’s book Tough Things First is his leadership, management and business ethics manifesto. This program is exclusively for current UVU students from any discipline.

Applications Closed for Spring 2024 Event

Using this template, fill out the application where you will submit it through the form below:

SUBMIT APPLICATION HERE

 

Requirements

  1. At least one primary member of the team must be a current student (enrolled in a course of 6 months or longer in pursuit of an endorsement, diploma, associates, bachelors, or graduate degree at Utah Valley University). 
  2. Meet with a mentor at the Entrepreneurship Institute (KB 102)
  3. Submit a final Use of Funds report

 

Timeline

This event will take place on April 10th from 4-7 PM in the Keller Building Vallejo Auditorium,  room 102AB. The audience will include the general public, students, their families, and invited community members, mentors, and investors. 

                                   

Format for Pitch Event:

  1. Pitch: 5-minute pitch outlining your business concept, business model, and your funding request (up to $2,500), followed by 3 minutes of Q&A by our judging panel at the ZinnStarter event (held in the Fall and Spring semesters).
  2. An accompanying Pitch Deck (12 slides maximum).

 

Evaluation Criteria

  1. Demonstrated understanding of the problem to be solved
  2. Clear presentation of a solution (concept-stage is okay)
  3. Deep understanding of the marketoqwinners
  4. Reasonable revenue model and pathway to profitability
  5. Well-outlined competitive advantage and value proposition

Don’t have any ideas yet? We believe in you! Schedule a mentoring session to brainstorm and watch this video on how to get and evaluate startup ideas: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Th8JoIan4dg&t=1s 

 

Prizes

  • Up to $2500 seed funding  Sponsored by The ZinnStarter Program.

 

ZinnStarter Logo

ZinnStarter 

ZinnStarter exists to ignite the next generation of entrepreneurs. This includes giving them encouragement and mentoring as well as cash.

ZinnStarter’s mission is to:

  • Inculcate the next generation of entrepreneurs to create enduring businesses
  • Provide seed money for promising business plans
  • Provide students with Ray Zinn’s leadership, management and entrepreneurship knowledge

 

Central Bank Logo

Milestone Funding

Thanks to the generous support of Central Bank, we're empowering aspiring student entrepreneurs with milestone funding to kickstart their businesses.

Seed-stage financing is available to UVU students starting a business who need funds for early development of a new product or service.

 

cff

Campus Founders Fund is a student-run venture fund focused on empowering student-entrepereneurs. To date, CFF has backed 40+ university-based startups. Students can to pitch to raise $10-15K. For more details, contact Grace Ericksen at grace@campusfounders.com  or Riley Richardson at riley@campusfounders.com.