Startup Crash Course

About

Startup Crash Course @ TU Berlin is a fast-paced, hands-on entrepreneurship bootcamp for students from all disciplines. Over four weeks, participants will go from identifying real-world problems to pitching investor-ready startup ideas. Through action-oriented learning, guest speakers, and real-world challenges, students gain practical skills to build startups or apply entrepreneurial thinking in any career.

Course leader

Daria (Dash) Markova, Mario Steinbuch

Target group

The TU Berlin Summer & Winter School is focused on international students interested in studying short courses at the TU Berlin. The majority of our participants are bachelor students. Please include details here on which disciplines are most suited to your course. Students and working professionals who want to start their own business. Students of all disciplines are welcome.

Course aim

Key objective: To equip students with the tools, mindset, and confidence to turn a problem into a validated business opportunity, culminating in a professional startup pitch to real investors.

Overall

1. Understand the startup journey
2. Validate ideas through real-world testing.
3. Build key entrepreneurial skills.
4. Pitch with confidence to real investors.

Problem

1. Understand what makes a good startup problem
2. Formulate clear problem and customer hypotheses
3. Conduct customer discovery interviews
4. Define a target customer persona
5. Calculate market size and opportunity
6. Learn to present and pitch the problem space

Solution

1. Match customer problem to value proposition
2. Build a low-fidelity MVP and define testing methods
3. Draft a value hypothesis and test assumptions
4. Explore product feasibility and operations
5. Develop a basic financial model (costs, CAC, LTV)
6. Practice presenting MVP tests and insights

Traction

1. Design and test a sales funnel and acquisition strategy
2. Create a revenue model and pricing approach
3. Practice customer outreach and sales conversations
4. Learn startup team dynamics and early hiring
5. Understand how to align team roles with goals
6. Pitch the go-to-market and early traction strategy

Resources

1. Understand different startup funding options
2. Map out a funding funnel and runway strategy
3. Calculate a startup valuation and build a cap table
4. Learn the basics of investor relations (term sheets, data rooms)
5. Refine and deliver a high-quality investor pitch
6. Gain confidence by presenting to a real jury of investors

Fee info