Entrepreneurship Lab (not active, follow us on King's E-Lab)

What Entrepreneurship Lab (not active, follow us on King's E-Lab) does

King's Entrepreneurship Lab (King's E-Lab) is an academic entrepreneurship hub operating within King's College at the University of Cambridge, founded in 2021 and rebranded to its current form in 2023. It provides entrepreneurship education, incubation support, and community programming — including the SPARK one-year pathway, Social Venture Residential, Pitch@King's competition (with a £6,000 prize pot), weekly workshops, Tech Stack Workshops (covering tools such as Cursor, AWS Kiro, Neo4j, and Lovable), hackathons (notably LLM x Law), the Climate Challenge, and a speaker series — to University of Cambridge students, researchers, and recent alumni at no direct cost to participants.

The lab operates as a non-profit initiative of King's College, Cambridge, with no disclosed external funding rounds. It does not build proprietary technology products; rather, it runs programs and events leveraging venues such as the Turing Room, Audit Room, Provost's Drawing Room, and Keynes Lecture Theatre within King's College. It also convenes research initiatives such as Dialogues for Post-Conflict Futures and the Digital Energy Grid Summit, often in partnership with co-located Cambridge bodies including climaTRACES Lab and Cambridge Judge Business School.

Revenue mechanics are institutional rather than commercial: King's E-Lab is funded through King's College allocations, donor support, and corporate sponsorship (acknowledged at the Annual Dinner), and operates under the leadership of Provost Gillian Tett, Co-Founder/Director Kamiar Mohaddes, and Co-Founder Malcolm McKenzie (Dean of King's College, also Head of Corporate at Alvarez & Marsal). It does not charge participants for programs, and its go-to-market is community-led — primarily through university channels, Freshers Fair presence, and word-of-mouth within the Cambridge entrepreneurial community.

Name

Entrepreneurship Lab (not active, follow us on King's E-Lab)

Legal name

King's Entrepreneurship Lab

Website

https://kingselab.org

Company type

Private

Founded year

2021

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

11–50 employees

Short description

King's E-Lab is a non-profit entrepreneurship hub within King's College, University of Cambridge, founded in 2021. It delivers free programs — including SPARK, Pitch@King's, workshops, and a speaker series — to Cambridge students, researchers, and recent alumni, funded by the college and donors.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

University Entrepreneurship Programs

NAICS

Computer Training (611420)

SIC

Services-Educational Services (8200)

akta.pro primary industry

Entrepreneurship Foundations & Startup Basics (EDAMAHAA)

akta.pro secondary industries

Business Planning, Pitching & Competitions (Pitch Decks, Demo Days) (EDAMAHAB), Entrepreneurship, Business & Innovation Camps (EDAMALAL), Makerspace, Innovation Lab & Fab Lab Operations (Tools, Safety, Programming) (EDAEAGAI)

Keywords

• Entrepreneurship education
• Startup incubation programs
• University innovation support
• Venture mentorship
• Student entrepreneurship hub

Headquarters

HQ city

Cambridge

HQ country

United Kingdom

HQ region

Europe

Offices1 record

Markets served

GTM type

B2C

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Personnel, Operations, Marketing or Sales, Technology or R&D

Revenue model

1. Educational Institution Funding: King's E-Lab operates as part of King's College, Cambridge, a prestigious university institution. The lab provides entrepreneurship education, incubation support, and community programs at no direct cost to participants, suggesting funding from university allocations, donor support, and potentially corporate sponsorships.

Go-to-market motion1 record

Distribution channels2 records

Marketing channels4 records

Core offering

King's E-Lab is an academic entrepreneurship hub at King's College, University of Cambridge that delivers education, incubation, research, and community programs to University of Cambridge students, researchers, and recent alumni. Offerings include the SPARK one-year pathway programme, Pitch@King's pitching competition with a £6,000 prize pot, Social Venture Residential, weekly workshops and brunches, Tech Stack Workshops, speaker series featuring Nobel Laureates and global CEOs, entrepreneurship prizes, and the LLM x Law Hackathon. All programmes are provided free of charge to participants, funded through university allocations, donor support, and corporate sponsorships.

Product overview

King's E-Lab is an educational and incubation hub at King's College, Cambridge that offers a portfolio of programmes and events supporting student entrepreneurs. The ecosystem includes SPARK (a one-year pathway programme), Pitch@King's (pitching competition with £6,000 prize pot), Entrepreneurship Prizes (including King's College and Mastercard Foundation competitions), Social Venture Residential, Weekly Brunches & Workshops, Tech Stack Workshops, LLM x Law Hackathon, Climate Challenge, and Dialogues for Post-Conflict Futures research series. The E-Lab also hosts a Speaker Series featuring prominent entrepreneurs, executives, and academics. These offerings work together to provide comprehensive support from idea development through to pitching and competition, with both entrepreneurial and technical tracks available.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Brands

• Pitch@King's: Pitch practice opportunity with competitive rounds and £6000 prize pot
• Entrepreneurship Prizes
• SPARK
• Social Venture Residential
• Weekly Brunches
• LEGO Serious Play Workshops
• LLM x Law Hackathon

Products and services

• SPARK A one-year pathway programme for University of Cambridge students, researchers, and recent alumni to materialize their ideas into action, providing mentorship, resources, and a Demo Day showcase opportunity.
• Pitch@King's A pitching programme offering opportunities to practice pitching skills with E-Lab support and compete for a prize pot of £6,000, with winners receiving fast-track access to the Hult Prize Final.
• Entrepreneurship Prizes Competition programmes including King's College Entrepreneurship Prize, Mastercard Foundation Scholars Program Entrepreneurship Prize Competition, and CUE Startup Competition, each with prize pools and mentorship opportunities.
• Social Venture Residential A year-long extracurricular programme cultivating an entrepreneurial mindset for sustainable and ethical projects with positive social and environmental impact.
• Weekly Brunches & Workshops A weekly series providing students with guidance, connections, and support, featuring dual streams of entrepreneurial and technical workshops with industry speakers.
• Tech Stack Workshops Hands-on technical workshops covering various technology tools and platforms including Build with Cursor, Build with AWS Kiro, Build with Neo4j, Build with Lovable, and Build with Browser Use.
• LLM x Law Hackathon An annual hackathon exploring how large language models are reshaping the legal world, hosted with Cambridge Judge Business School, featuring lightning talks and tech showcases.
• Speaker Series Regular talks featuring founders, CEOs, executives, academics, policymakers, and Nobel Laureates discussing entrepreneurship and innovation topics.
• Climate Challenge An annual competition for climate innovation ideas, with finalist teams pitching to expert judges; winners receive recognition and networking opportunities.

Named customers1 record

Segments3 records

Ideal customer profiles2 records

Technology focussed No

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Partnerships

Eight partnerships are on record, tiered core and minor.

• Mastercard Foundation Scholars Program at CambridgecoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerE-Lab runs a year-long extracurricular program in collaboration with the Mastercard Foundation Scholars Program at Cambridge, cultivating an entrepreneurial mindset for students to apply to sustainable and ethical projects with positive social and environmental impact. This includes the Mastercard Foundation Scholars Programme Entrepreneurship Prize Competition.
• Cambridge Judge Business SchoolcoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerCollaborates on climate initiatives including the climaTRACES Lab, entrepreneurship workshops, and policy discussions. Joint programs include the Cambridge Climate Challenge and various expos and conferences.
• Cambridge Blockchain SocietyminorStrategic or Co-development PartnerCo-hosts Weekly Brunches and workshops focused on blockchain technology, Web3, and decentralized systems. Provides publication, hackathon, incubation, and implementation opportunities to the best projects.
• Cambridge University Entrepreneurs (CUE)coreChannel Partner/ Reseller/ DistributorAnnual CUE Startup Competition is partnered with King's E-Lab, bringing together the best of both organizations. The competition features 3-minute pitches with a chance to win £5,000 and includes mentorship in strategy, pitching, legal, and intellectual property.
• King's CollegecoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerE-Lab is hosted by King's College and runs the King's College Entrepreneurship Prize competition, founded in 2014 to encourage development of entrepreneurial ideas and convert creativity and knowhow into sustainable commercial and social benefit.
• ING BankminorStrategic or Co-development PartnerING executives speak at E-Lab events on topics of entrepreneurship and innovation within large financial institutions, covering influencing the level playing field, disentangling complexity, cross-fertilization, ownership, and hospitality to successfully drive transformation.
• Cambridge climaTRACES LabcoreStrategic or Co-development PartnerCo-director Kamiar Mohaddes leads both E-Lab and climaTRACES Lab. Joint initiatives include climate change and innovation policy discussions, roundtables with international delegations, and the Digital Energy Grid Summit.
• Cambridge UnionminorStrategic or Co-development PartnerE-Lab partners with Cambridge Union for events including the Cambridge China Business Forum, providing venues and collaborative opportunities for entrepreneurship discussions.

Scale indicators4 records

Recent moves6 records

Expansion highlights4 records

Direct peers

• Harvard Innovation Labs (i-lab): Harvard's central entrepreneurship hub providing workspace, mentorship, and programming to Harvard students and alumni. Directly comparable to King's E-Lab in serving elite university founders through structured programmes, speaker series, and pitch competitions.
• Oxford Saïd Entrepreneurship Programmes: Oxford University's entrepreneurship centre offering programmes, events, and competitions to Oxford students. Comparable as a UK elite-university entrepreneurship hub targeting student founders from STEM and humanities backgrounds.
• Cambridge Judge Business School Entrepreneurship Centre: Cambridge's business-school-hosted entrepreneurship programmes including the Entrepreneurship Studies MBA track and the Cambridge Climate Challenge. Direct peer within the same university ecosystem, with active co-programming partnership (climaTRACES Lab).
• Imperial College Enterprise Lab: Imperial College London's student entrepreneurship hub offering programmes, mentorship, and pitch competitions to STEM-heavy student founders. Comparable in deep-tech founder focus and UK university-affiliated entrepreneurship support model.
• Stanford StartX: Stanford-affiliated founder accelerator supporting Stanford students, faculty, and alumni through mentorship, workshops, and Demo Day showcases. Comparable in its pipeline-of-founders approach and Demo Day pitching structure mirroring SPARK.
• MIT Martin Trust Center for MIT Entrepreneurship: University-hosted entrepreneurship centre at MIT offering delta v, Sandbox, and competitions to MIT students. Directly comparable model: elite university affiliation, student-founder pipeline, mentorship programmes, and demo-day pitch competitions targeting science and technology ventures.
• Cambridge University Entrepreneurs (CUE): Cambridge's longest-running student-run entrepreneurship society and Startup Competition. Direct peer and explicit partner (Annual CUE Startup Competition is partnered with King's E-Lab), competing for the same founder applicants.

Broad incumbents

• Entrepreneur First: London-based talent-investment model that recruits graduates (including from Cambridge) into cohorts to form deep-tech startups. Broader incumbent operating commercially in the same UK deep-tech founder-formation space King's E-Lab cultivates.
• Y Combinator: World's largest startup accelerator offering seed funding, mentorship, and Demo Day to early-stage founders. Aspirational downstream peer — King's E-Lab's SPARK pipeline feeds candidates into accelerators like YC, and both operate a Demo Day competition format.

Regional players

• Cambridge Enterprise: University of Cambridge's official technology transfer and commercialisation office. Sits alongside King's E-Lab in the same Cambridge ecosystem, handling IP, licensing, and venture formation for Cambridge research — partially overlapping on the founder-pipeline dimension.

Market position

Strengths1 record

Weaknesses1 record

Competitive moat4 records

Key risks5 records

Key highlights5 records

Customer concentration

• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/e-lab

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles4 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about Entrepreneurship Lab (not active, follow us on King's E-Lab)