All students! Creativity, Innovation, and Entrepreneurship (CIE) aims to foster creativity, entrepreneurial ingenuity, willingness to take risks, resilience, and competence in addressing problems and challenges for all students.
Startups, research, food, incubation, cool people, funding, innovation, co-working, jobs, mentorship, travel - you get the idea!
The UR Summer Incubator application is now live: https://ursf.richmond.edu/apply/index.html. For CIE SI applicants, the required online module is also available on Blackboard.
Priority Deadline for Summer Housing: March 24, 2025.
Final Deadline: April 25, 2025.
QUESTIONS?
For questions, please email Somiah Lattimore, Senior Director of Creativity, Innovation, and Entrepreneurship (CIE) Initiative, Office of the Provost.
The 2025-2026 Batch is now live - apply here:
https://forms.gle/wY23wKZntzkYxNZTA
Bench Top Innovations, a Robins Business School program in collaboration with the Jepson School of Leadership, the School of Arts and Sciences, and the University of Richmond’s Creativity, Innovation, and Entrepreneurship initiative, is a year-long student-managed course where 16 students collaborate, ideate, iterate and commercialize a consumer packaged food or beverage product concept. Yes, you create and run a revenue-generating business!
In the first semester, you work (and compete) in teams to ideate and develop innovative yet practical food or beverage product concepts for commercialization. The first semester ends with a public demo day where the UR and RVA startup community samples your products. A food and beverage expert panel selects which has the most commercial viability.
During the second semester, you work as one unit (all 16 company "employees"), launching and scaling your business. Throughout, your instructors, advisors, and guest speakers will supplement your experience with content applicable to the issues being faced by your company.
Students make all decisions — which product to launch, which students will hold what roles, what experiments to invest in, and what pivots need to be made. We promise you the opportunity to learn. Hopefully, you will learn about yourself, dealing with co-workers, managing through uncertainty, and overcoming adversity.
There are 16 available spots. Interested students need first to identify if they meet the following required criteria:
The 2025-2026 Batch is now live - apply here:https://forms.gle/wY23wKZntzkYxNZTA
Dr. Joel Mier, lecturer of Marketing at the Robins School of Business can be reached for questions about Batch Fall 25.
OTHER QUESTIONS?
For questions, please email Somiah Lattimore, Senior Director of Creativity, Innovation, and Entrepreneurship (CIE) Initiative, Office of the Provost.
UR's Creativity, Innovation, and Entrepreneurship initiative has received a $50,000 grant from the Joan and Morgan Massey Foundation to support the Richmond Innovation Fellows program.
Three budding entrepreneurs develop a concept for a disposable cup that will detect date-rape drugs when they are added to a drink.
UR’s Bench Top Innovations program is highlighted.
Marketing lecturer Joel Mier is quoted in this feature on UR’s Bench Top Innovations program.
UR’s Bench Top Innovations program is highlighted.
Marketing lecturer Joel Mier is quoted in this feature on UR’s Bench Top Innovations program.
For questions, please email Somiah Lattimore
Senior Director of Creativity, Innovation, and Entrepreneurship (CIE) Initiative
Office of the Provost