斯坦福商学院创业工厂解密

    在这份榜单上，哈佛商学院(Harvard Business School)的毕业生占据了34个名额。斯坦福毕业生也不甘落后，共有32家初创公司上榜，其中包括视频流媒体公司Viki、卫星影像公司Skybox、移动初创公司Karma Science、学生贷款再融资公司SoFi和基因检测公司Counsyl。位居榜首的是一个在斯坦福校园如雷贯耳的名字：野火(Wildfire)，一家创建于2008年的社交媒体营销公司，创始人是一对分别毕业于哈佛和斯坦福的夫妇。谷歌(Google)2012年收购了野火公司，交易价格据说高达3.5亿美元。

    位居第6位的SoFi就是在创业车库诞生的。2011年，迈克•卡格尼，丹•麦克林，詹姆斯•菲尼根和伊恩•布雷迪构想出了一个点子，以更低的利率帮助学生筹集资金以偿还学生贷款。他们呼吁斯坦福校友借钱给正在进行再融资的斯坦福学生。“一年的工夫，他们就募集了好几百万美元，”赞尼奥斯说。截至去年9月份，SoFi已经为4,500名借款人筹集了4.5亿美元贷款，人均募得9,400美元。

    身为斯坦福大学创业研究中心的教导主任，赞尼奥斯还鼓励MBA、工程师、律师和医学院学生相互协作。最近一个名为“寻找你的团队”的联谊活动共吸引了250位来自斯坦福大学不同院系的学生。他们正在讨论各自的工作，赞尼奥斯说，如果一切顺利的话，这些学生将组建创业团队。

    与此同时，创业车库学生杜安正在尝试创建一个研究生，特别是MBA学生的在线网络，这些学生一直在寻找计算机科学家帮助他们打造产品。杜安开玩笑地说：“他们会带上一块比萨饼去工程系那边溜达。”

    转变，坚持或消亡

    创业车库在一个名为CoLab，明亮的现代空间授课，这些显然是为了模仿车库的氛围，只不过这个车库充满了白色的宜家( Ikea)风格家具和许多白板。去年9月，100名学生申请参加这门课程。根据他们提交的旨在解决客户痛点的新产品或新服务创意，赞尼奥斯最终接收了70名学生。今天，20多名学生聚在一起，参加一个关于初创公司人力资源问题的讨论会。

    许多商学院的选修课程都使用现实世界的商业案例来传授创业技巧，MBA毕业生往往会在两三年后创办一家公司。作为二年级的选修课，创业车库要求学生借鉴埃里克•里斯宣扬的精益创业模式，迅速开发、推出产品或服务，以避免代价高昂的失败。赞尼奥斯说：“你变成你自己的案例。”

    今天的任务是进行一个竞争力的分析，确定竞争对手的商业模式，并为某位学生的企业确定一个“独特的差异点”。本学季即将结束，团队已经建立了一个为期12个月的营运计划。

    去年，赞尼奥斯采用“翻转课堂”这样一个正在斯坦福校园流行的理念，改变了创业车库的授课方式。不是利用宝贵的课堂时间讲课，翻转课堂要求学生提前观看录制的讲座。学生团队观看讲座，同时在网上提交功课，这样他们就可以利用课堂时间应用自己已经学到的知识。

    去年秋天共有25支团队启动了创业车库，目前仅剩下12支。其中有几支团队已经改弦易辙。有一支团队最初构想了一个面向新车市场的创业理念，但最终转向巴西的宠物托管B&B服务领域。另一支团队放弃了一个针对医疗市场的创意。赞尼奥斯说：“他们碰到了障碍，并且发现无论怎么做也不会产生经济效益，但他们可以迅速地做出调整，把相同的知识应用到他们正在探索的全新领域。”

    Harvard Business School graduates have launched 34 of the top 100 MBA-founded startups. Stanford grads weren't far behind, with 32 startups on the list -- including video streaming company Viki, satellite imaging company Skybox, mobile startup Karma Science, student loan refinancing company SoFi, and genetic testing startup Counsyl. At the top of the list is a name well-known on Stanford's campus: Wildfire, a social media marketing company founded by a Harvard/Stanford couple in 2008. Google (GOOG) acquired WildFire in 2012 for a reported $350 million.

    SoFi, No. 6 on the list, came out of Startup Garage. In 2011, Mike Cagney, Dan Macklin, James Finnigan, and Ian Brady had an idea for refinancing student loans at lower rates. They decided to ask Stanford alumni to lend money to Stanford students who were refinancing. "They raised a couple of million within a year," Zenios says. By last September, SoFi was funding $450 million in loans to 4,500 borrowers at an average savings of $9,400 per borrower.

    As faculty director of CES, Zenios also encourages collaboration between MBAs, engineers, lawyers, and medical school students. A recent "Finding Your Team" social mixer drew 250 people from different Stanford programs, who discuss what they're working on and, if all goes well, get together to form startup teams, Zenios says.

    Meantime, Startup Garage student Duane is trying to connect graduate students online, particularly MBA students, who are always searching for computer scientists to help build a product. "They'll go over and hang out at the engineering department with a pizza," Duane jokes.

    Pivot, persevere or perish

    Startup Garage is held in a bright, modern space called the CoLab, which is meant to resemble a garage; that is, if the garage were filled with white, Ikea-style furniture and many whiteboards. This past September, 100 students applied to take the course. Zenios accepted 70 students with ideas for a new product or service that addressed a customer pain point. More than 20 students are gathered today for a panel on HR issues at startups.

    Many business school electives use real-world business cases to teach entrepreneurialism, and MBA grads move on to start a company two, three years later. Startup Garage, a second-year elective, asks students to build an idea for a company using, in part, the lean startup model, Eric Ries's method of developing and rolling out products or services quickly to avoid costly failures. "You become your own case," Zenios says.

    Today's assignment was to do a competitive analysis, defining rivals' business models and a "unique point of differentiation" for the student's business. With the academic quarter ending soon, teams have already built a 12-month operating plan.

    Last year, Zenios revamped Startup Garage by flipping the classroom, an idea that's gaining traction at Stanford. Instead of using precious classroom time for lectures, a flipped classroom asks students to watch recorded lectures with instructors ahead of time. Student teams watch lectures and file their assignments online so they can spend class time applying what they've learned.

    Of 25 teams that began Startup Garage in fall, 12 are left. A few have pivoted. One team that started with an idea for a new car market ended up switching to a petsitting B&B service in Brazil. Another ditched an idea in the medical market. "They bump up against something [and discover] the economics will never work no matter what we do, but they can apply the same learning to the new space they're exploring and move really quickly," Zenios says.