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Entrepreneurs are coming out of the woodwork at CU Boulder. It's no accident.听

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Kimberly Drennan had two goals in late summer 2014, and neither involved starting a business.

The CU instructor, an architect, was honing an idea for an upcoming sophomore design studio and aiming to aid America鈥檚 long-suffering honeybees.

Yet three years later she鈥檚 CEO of HiveTech Solutions, LLC, a Boulder-based start-up firm developing technology and data services for commercial beekeepers to monitor hive health remotely, enabling timely, efficient interventions.

鈥淎ll of this was new to me,鈥� Drennan said of start-up life.

At root, HiveTech is the product of an idea, an attitude and an increasingly robust CU Boulder entrepreneurial ecosystem that encourages students, faculty and staff to see themselves as enterprise builders 鈥� and helps bring enterprises to life.

CU hasn鈥檛 always been an easy place for would-be entrepreneurs. That began to change after local investors and business leaders convened with CU professors and executives in 2007 to tackle听two big questions: What is an entrepreneurial university, and how could CU Boulder become one?

Among the first initiatives to emerge from the 35-member group鈥檚 discussion was the New Venture Challenge (NVC), a nine-month, incubator-like program culminating in a spring championship with real money at stake.

In 2016 HiveTech won NVC鈥檚 grand prize, walking away with nearly $25,000 in all. The most recent top five finishers netted almost $100,000 in prizes and private investment. Greater听sums will be on the line in 2017-18, NVC鈥檚 10th anniversary.

Since NVC鈥檚 founding, CU Boulder has vastly expanded support for entrepreneurs across campus. There鈥檚 broader access to relevant academic courses, new co-working and maker spaces, a selective business accelerator program, intensifying interaction with Boulder鈥檚 start-up community 鈥� and a growing appreciation that entrepreneurship isn鈥檛 just for MBAs and software developers.

鈥淣ow it鈥檚 really the opposite of 10 years ago,鈥� said the law school鈥檚 Brad Bernthal, who oversaw NVC until this year and teaches a popular venture capital course. 鈥淚t鈥檚 a different university.鈥�

NVC now falls under the purview of CU鈥檚 Research & Innovation Office, home of a burgeoning cross-campus innovation and entrepreneurship initiative.

Ideas to Action

Amid all this, in 2014, Kim Drennan was exploring projects for her environmental design students.

Scouting a potential site on CU鈥檚 East Campus one summer day, she spied a cluster of beehives along Boulder Creek. Aware of the dramatic decline of the honeybee population in recent decades, she wondered if there might be a way to help them through architectural design. Maybe her class could dream up better hives.

Drennan tracked down the hives鈥� owner, a doctoral student named Chelsea Cook (PhD鈥�16), who was studying how bees regulate hive temperature. They then met with Drennan鈥檚 faculty colleague Justin Bellucci (EnvDes鈥�08; MCivEngr鈥�12), an expert in sensors. 鈥淲e sat down over martinis and just started talking,鈥� Drennan said.

The idea began to evolve beyond the project her students would ultimately take on. Maybe Drennan, Cook and Bellucci could develop a sensor technology system that would generate data for commercial beekeepers 鈥� data about hive temperature and humidity, perhaps, or weight and acoustics. This would add a more scientific dimension to beekeeping, minimize reliance on time-consuming visual inspections and benefit both bees and hive operators鈥� bottom line.

When Drennan filed an invention disclosure with CU鈥檚 tech transfer office, she learned about the NVC and dove in headfirst.

鈥淲e wanted to test if our idea could be a business,鈥� she said. 鈥淲e really didn鈥檛 know.鈥�

NVC has deliberately minimal entry requirements. Teams need one person with a valid CU ID 鈥� faculty, student or staff 鈥� an idea they can articulate and the chutzpah to present it to a live audience in 60 seconds at an annual fall 鈥渜uick pitch night.鈥� Last year 30 teams showed up, including NVC 9 overall winner Give & Go, which has developed an automated film-editing process for sports teams.

Give & Go ultimately walked away with $64,000 in seed money. Second听place finisher ReForm, which is working on self-adjusting prosthetic limb sockets, netted $21,500.

A year earlier, Cook (now a postdoc at Arizona State University) had made HiveTech鈥檚 opening pitch, taking home the award for best idea, the first in a series of successes.

鈥淚t was a real shot of energy,鈥� Drennan said 鈥� and yet not HiveTech鈥檚 biggest score that October night.

Sue Heilbronner, CEO of MergeLane, a firm that cultivates and invests in women-led start-ups, was among the judges. Peggy Tautz (MBA鈥�17), then a CU MBA student with an engineering background, was in the audience.

鈥淪ue actually grabbed Peggy鈥檚 hand, grabbed me and said 鈥榊鈥檃ll need to talk,鈥欌�� Drennan said.

Heilbronner went on to mentor HiveTech. Tautz helped the team explain the technical aspects of their evolving project in terms businesspeople could appreciate.

CU Boulder's start-up infrastructure is paying off.

At a later mentor-matching event, the HiveTech founders met other local businesspeople who would help them test their ideas, asking tough questions and unearthing 鈥渁ll the pieces we didn鈥檛 have in place,鈥� Drennan said.

鈥淓very time we went to one of those events, some other little golden nugget showed up,鈥� she said.

The HiveTech trio found a name, won midway NVC contests and gradually came to see the firm as both a technology听and data services provider. The founders also polished a five-minute pitch for NVC鈥檚 championship round.

In the spring, Drennan, Cook and Bellucci delivered it jointly before a standing-room-only campus crowd.

Before the night was out, NVC 8鈥檚 four-judge panel declared HiveTech the year鈥檚 overall winner.

Acceleration听

Fresh off the NVC victory, HiveTech won a spot in another campus program for entrepreneurs, Catalyze CU. Where NVC is a highly-inclusive shaper and filter of ideas, Catalyze CU is a selective听business accelerator that hastens the formation of actual companies.

Founded in 2014 by the College of Engineering, Catalyze CU offers entrepreneurs of all backgrounds an intensive eight-week summer boot camp: Weekly lectures on business fundamentals plus opportunities to rub elbows with other start-up teams while refining their ideas with mentors and beginning to build businesses. Each team gets a $4,000 stipend.

Drennan learned about raising capital, business plans, budgeting and types of corporate structures. She and her co-founders labored over their technology, began talking with potential customers and expanded their idea of what the company could be. Was it just a hardware maker, or a data services and analytics firm, too?

By the end, the HiveTech team better understood their aims and potential and were convinced that an architect, a civil engineer and a biologist could also be entrepreneurs.

That鈥檚 the mentality CU wants to foster, said Sarabeth Berk, assistant director of the innovation and entrepreneurship initiative 鈥� one that 鈥減ushes people beyond what they thought was possible for themselves.鈥�

HiveTech is still in its early stages. The firm is perfecting its technology and fine-tuning its focus to address the needs of large-scale growing operations in particular. But there鈥檚 momentum. The company has grown to six people听with diverse expertise. It鈥檚 testing its latest prototype on dozens of hives while courting customers and investors. And it鈥檚 winning notice outside Boulder: The U.S. Dept. of Agriculture recently awarded HiveTech $100,000 to forge ahead.

鈥淭he training wheels are off,鈥� said Drennan. 鈥淲e are in full-scale execution mode.鈥�

Without NVC and Catalyze CU, HiveTech might be a good idea, she said 鈥� but not a business. 鈥淚t wouldn鈥檛 be anywhere but back in the classroom,鈥� she said.

Photos courtesy HiveTech Solutions;听漏 iStock/Antagain