Builders, Doers, Makers & Entrepreneurs
Make Your Ideas a Reality
From courses, to minors, to innovation centers, challenges, and the start up culture of Los Angeles, USC has what you need to make your ideas a reality. You will be able to build and execute your ideas for your new tech start up, social entrepreneurship idea, business venue and more.
Academics & Programs
USC Viterbi gives students space to explore how ideas become practical solutions. Through a mix of coursework, minors, and hands‑on innovation programs, students learn how to design, build, and test technologies that respond to real needs. The approach emphasizes creative problem‑solving, collaboration, and applying concepts beyond the classroom. Students also gain experience with the process of developing and launching ventures—whether technical, entrepreneurial, or socially focused—while engaging with an ecosystem that encourages ethical and inclusive innovation.
Entrepreneurship Classes
A sampling of Entrepreneurship classes
- Building the High Tech Start Up
- Founders Dilemmas
- Digital Playbook for Entrepreneurs
- Entrepreneurial Mindset: Taking the Leap
- Social Innovation Design Lab
- Science of Peak Performance
- Family Business
- Introduction to Social Entrepreneurship
- Practicum in Business Issues (Internship)
- Field Project in Entrepreneurship
- and more!
Minor in Entrepreneurship
- Entrepreneurship
- Social Entrepreneurship
- The Digital Entrepreneurship
- Technology Commercialization
- Performance Science
- Media Entrepreneurship & Economics
- Game Entrepreneurship
$
340000Given Out to Student Start Ups Every Year through Competitions
Competitions & Grants
USC offers an exceptionally rich ecosystem for entrepreneurial undergraduates, backed by hundreds of thousands of dollars in annual funding and world‑class support. Students can compete in flagship programs like the New Venture Seed Competition, which awards more than $150,000 each year to early‑stage ventures, or the engineering‑focused Maseeh Entrepreneurship Prize Competition, offering $100,000 in prizes for breakthrough technologies.
Student Stories
Hear from USC Viterbi students
My Summer Internship at Kimley-Horn!
My Summer Internship at Kimley-Horn!
So you think AI is cool…
So you think AI is cool…
How I Spent the Summer Planning SoCal’s First Quantum Hackathon
How I Spent the Summer Planning SoCal’s First Quantum Hackathon
My East Coast Summer
My East Coast Summer
Staying Busy on Maui While Taking an Unconventional Path!
Staying Busy on Maui While Taking an Unconventional Path!
Summer in the PNW
Summer in the PNW
Exploring the Amazon
Exploring the Amazon
Entrepreneurship On The Podcast
Entrepreneurship Student Organizations
Student Organizations build the foundation of the start up culture among Viterbi undergrads at USC. With 1/3 of Viterbi-affiliated student organizations having a focus on innovation and entrepreneurship, there’s an organization to help you develop and grow your idea, or even just learn what this crazy start up craze is all about! Learn more about some of the organizations and what they’re doing below.
The Baum Family Makerspace: A Student Playground for Innovation
Many of USC Viterbi’s design teams are headquartered in The Baum Family Maker Space. BFMS is Viterbi’s premier maker space for innovation and collaboration, and provides engineering students with a variety of tools to bring their ideas to life.
Code the Change USC
Code the Change produces free digital products for non-profits and social enterprises, helping these organizations increase their impact through technology. In the process, Code the Change gives student developers the opportunity to use their skills for social change.
Learn more about CTC
Hack SC
Hack SC is a weekend competition among students from schools all over the country at USC where students “hack” a product in 30 hours. They encourage students to be curious and explore multiple disciplines of hacking, including iOS, Android, 3-D Printing, Virtual Reality & Games, and Web Applications.
Learn more about Hack SC
Did you know that Southern California graduates the largest number of engineering and computer science graduate students in the country?
It’s true — more than the Bay Area, more than Boston, more than any other city or region in the United States. This tremendous talent pool is fueling the explosion in the innovation ecosystem in our area, also known as Silicon Beach.
The University of Southern California, and particularly the USC Viterbi School of Engineering, is strategically positioned in terms of both abundant human capital and physical location to creatively shape this environment. With two of our research powerhouses — the Information Sciences Institute and the Institute for Creative Technologies — located in the heart of Silicon Beach, we stand ready to serve as the premier private research university driving technology innovation in Southern California — and to transform Silicon Beach into SCilicon Beach! Innovation and technology entrepreneurship are becoming indispensable pillars of engineering schools around the world.
