Program Overview
Designed for professionals from a variety of academic, business, and personal backgrounds, this intensive program develops the suite of creative and business skills needed to drive innovation and development of new enterprises in today’s agricultural and food industries, mastering solutions to feed the world.
The program is based at Colorado State University’s new Spur campus, located at the National Western Center in north Denver.
Program Options
The Masters in Agribusiness and Food Innovation Management can be pursued an intensive 16-month full-time experience, or as a more measured 28-month part-time experience suited for working professionals. A 9-credit graduate certificate in innovation and entrepreneurship, with a focus on agriculture and food, is offered in partnership with CSU’s MBA program in the College of Business.
Coursework
Coursework In the classroom students engage in graduate level coursework across three categories:
Conceptual foundations and core business skills
Ag & food industry specific topics and skills
Business development clinical coursework and practicum credits
All courses are taught by tenured faculty or experienced business professionals. Many courses regularly incorporate guest speakers or live projects with industry partners.
The industry and community is our classroom, providing extensive opportunities to network with professionals from companies, nonprofits, and regulatory agencies. Guest lectures, seminars, and fieldtrips bring together students, faculty, and a wide range of innovators across agriculture and food. Denver and the Colorado Front Range hosts a multitude of conferences, trade shows, and networking events in which faculty and students regularly participate.
Networking
The industry and community is our classroom, providing extensive opportunities to network with professionals from companies, nonprofits, and regulatory agencies. Guest lectures, seminars, and fieldtrips bring together students, faculty, and a wide range of innovators across agriculture and food. Denver and the Colorado Front Range hosts a multitude of conferences, trade shows, and networking events in which faculty and students regularly participate.
The Business Development Practicum
The master’s degree culminates with hands-on, real-world experience through a unique, integrative, team-based, business development practicum. Student teams work with external partners to develop real innovations, guided by CSU faculty, entrepreneur-in-residence mentors, and industry advisors. Students choose one of two practicum tracks:
Venture Creation Track
Students team analyze the market potential of a new business prospect or invention, develop a business plan, seek to raise capital, and prepare to launch a startup venture to commercialize that idea.
Corporate Partner Track
Students engage with a company to analyze the market potential of a new idea or invention to implement within that company’s current offerings, to launch a new line of business, or to develop a spin-out or licensing strategy.
Outcomes
The practical, hands-on nature of this program offers opportunities for students to meet their career goals in a variety of ways.
From the Venture Creation Track
Students may be successful in launching a startup out of their practicum project and could take a financial stake and even a leadership role in the newly formed company.
From the Corporate Partner Track
Students and their corporate partners may find there is an excellent fit for further employment after their practicum project is complete.
In All Cases
Students launch from this program into the professional world with new relationships, skills, and knowledge that make them highly competitive innovators and entrepreneurs in today’s rapidly evolving agriculture and food industries.
The Perfect Classroom: a World Class Innovation Ecosystem
A number of geographic, demographic, and economic factors have driven innovation in the agricultural and food system globally. Over the last several decades, all of the essential elements have converged in the Front Range for the emergence and growth of an innovation-led industry cluster in agriculture and food.
Recently, the Denver metro region was ranked 5th in the world among startup ecosystems in agriculture and food. The development, attraction, and retention of talent is the first and foremost factor driving the growth of such an innovation ecosystem. Those companies and the incredible people leading them are the guest speakers, partners, mentors, and advisors that add so much value to the program.
What Sets Us Apart?
There are many graduate programs around the U.S. offering to train the next generation of entrepreneurs, including most of the business schools at prominent universities. Nevertheless, these programs leave a gap for a graduate-level training that brings together entrepreneurship and the unique challenges of the agricultural value chain. Based upon extensive analysis of current offerings, this program stands out in the following ways:
Creating Entrepreneurs, Not Corporate Managers
At the graduate level, business programs are usually oriented toward management of larger corporations and the “MBA culture” tends to reflect that orientation. Startup ventures and innovative initiatives within large organizations, by definition, start as small projects that face unique challenges. Innovators and entrepreneurs are marked by a very different culture and mindset.
Specialized to the Ag and Food Value Chain
Specialized to the ag and food value chain. The industry is teeming with opportunities. Spotting and exploiting these opportunities, however, requires specialized knowledge of the industry. Hot areas for startups in the ag/food tech sector include:
- Farm management software, big data, artificial intelligence, predictive analytics
- Sensors, networked devices, Internet of Things
- Farm robotics and autonomous vehicles
- Agbiotech, genetics, and microbiome
- Bioenergy and biomaterials
- Novel farming systems, controlled environment agriculture, vertical farms
- Agricultural marketplaces and supply-chain digitization
- Innovative food ingredients, alternative proteins, fermentation
- eGrocery and food delivery
- Retail and food service innovations
- In-home and meal prep innovations
- Post-consumer recycling and waste reduction
Vision for the Future
As students graduate from the program and go on to build their own companies and careers, they are invited to stay actively connected with the program, returning as guest speakers, as advisors, and as external idea partners on practicum projects, thus creating a robust alumni network that provides ongoing connections and opportunities throughout their careers.
