Student Run Companies
Friday, May 4th, 2007The other day I saw this device linked from digg. It’s not really that special, just a machine for climbing rope really fast. It’s certainly a nice piece of engineering, and it’ll be useful in certain professions, but the thing that really gets me about the article is this:
The students founded a company, Atlas Devices, based in Cambridge, MA, to commercialize the device, which is about the size of a power drill.
Too many times I’ve seen this same story. Students from MIT invent some cool device and start a company selling it. Why is it so easy for them to start companies like that all the time? Isn’t it hard to develop an idea into a marketable product? Is MIT doing anything else but forming groups to develop products? Most importantly, why haven’t they given me a call yet? 