Student Courses

This course introduces you to the nature, structure, and dynamics of the contemporary software industry.

It focuses on the key factors involved in ideating, hypothesizing, validating, and executing a viable and investable/return driven business model to launch a sustainable, scalable and profitable tech-based (software and/or hardware) business venture as a company founder or as an employee of an established company.

The course will be a team effort of four students per team. The scope of the course does not include not-for-profit or charity business models.​

DCSIL is a balloted process and we expect students to treat the course like they're working on a real startup. Listed below are some general expectations of all students as well as some targetted expectations for students in CSC491/2600.

• These are project courses and students should be prepared to meet and work outside of class hours.
• Students should be willing to self-learn additional processes and work as a team.
• Students should be open communicators and be willing to collaborate. No one student should dictate their team's goals.
• All students are expected to participate in product discussions on GitHub.com regardless of their familiarity with the platform.
• All students are expected to participate in discussions on Slack during and after class time (with reasonable work-life balance!)
• CSC491/2600 students must be familiar with software engineering (internships highly recommended) and be willing to adapt and self-learn new technologies to accomplish team objectives.
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• The high-technology business environment in general and the software industry in particular.
• The business concepts and principles behind creating and launching a successful tech venture.
• How to produce, present, and critique business proposals and plans for ventures, and how to develop business simulation and forecasting models in support of these plans.
• How to converse with and present to investors, executives, judging panels, incubators and accelerators.
• Upon successful completion of the course, you will have first-hand experience of the stages, processes, and challenges involved in transforming an idea into an investable and scalable business venture, and will be ideally positioned to begin launching your own tech venture.
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In this course, you will learn techniques and methodologies that will give you a distinct career advantage after graduation, whether or not you intend to work in a tech field.

It is designed to give you a true-to-life experience of the thought processes behind successful tech business ventures, which apply whether you are planning on creating your own startup or working for an established employer.

You and your team will devise a cool, innovative solution to a significant market problem. This will involve researching your customer base, forming and testing hypotheses, and producing a value proposition that will form the basis for your business model.

You will investigate your customer base and market by identifying the key activities, resources and partners needed for fulfillment.

This process culminates in a business model that both makes sense in a financial context and resonates with a venture capital (VC) or funding audience—the kind of audience who will eventually be visiting the class to critique your final product and business model.

This course sets very high standards for you because the business world demands nothing less. We have an obligation to ensure that your business education is thorough and demanding, and only students who are exceptionally dedicated and committed to developing mastery over the techniques and methodologies in this course will excel.

• Themes change on a term-by-term basis. They are announced 6-10 weeks prior to a term starting
• Each term will be mentored and guided by industry experts.
• Industry experts will provide us a theme of products (e.g. HealthCare AI, Music, Cyber Security, etc). They will be experts in that field.
• These themes and business partners are carefully chosen to make sure that startups will be working on marketable, viable startups.
• See themes from all terms
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