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S&T undergraduate and graduate students are invited to compete in the 2026 Startup Challenge.

Create a team of 2-5 and complete your registration by Oct. 6. Check the competition dates below for deadlines and required attendance.

Register today

About the Challenge

This is a great opportunity for students to learn more about what it takes to create a business concept and perfect it into a compelling ten-minute pitch. Teams that complete the learning modules will be eligible to advance to the finals where they will pitch their business model concept to a panel of judges for scholarship prize money.

Curriculum

The learning modules teams will complete are based on the 9 blocks business model and the curriculum was developed by Dr. Fang at Missouri S&T. 

The business model is the entrepreneur’s or manager’s logic of how a venture creates, delivers, and captures values. A business model must be simple, relevant, and intuitively understandable, and isn’t bounded by details and numbers. Different from a business plan which is a detail-based description and number-driven forecast based on the operation and activities of a business.

Scholarship Prize Money

  • $5,000 scholarship split among team members that win first place
  • $3,000 scholarship split among team members that win second place
  • $1,000 scholarship split among team members that win third place

Fall 2026 Competition Dates

Tuesday, Sep. 15

Innovation Lab 214

Information session

5-6 p.m.

Tuesday, Oct. 6

Deadline for teams to register.

Wednesday, Oct. 7

Carver-Turner, Havener Center

Required attendance at Real Entrepreneurs, Real Stories: S&T Student Panel

4-5 p.m.

Learn about real-life startups on S&T's campus from the students that are part of them. Students will share their journey into entrepreneurship, their experience in the early-stage accelerator and what they learned along the way. Open to all students, staff and faculty.
Monday, Oct. 19

Deadline to complete learning modules
Friday, Oct. 23

Finalist teams announced and paired with a mentor
Monday, Nov. 16

Final competition live pitch event to the judging panel

5 p.m.

Click here to join the zoom to watch the presentations! 

Past Challenges
2025 Challenge

For the first time, two student teams were the winners at Missouri S&T’s Startup Challenge on Nov. 17, splitting the scholarship prizes.

Read the story  
2024 Challenge

EcoBioCapture, a business concept based on a process developed by two S&T students for farming operations to meet emissions regulations while developing supplemental food for their livestock, won the $5,000 first-place prize in the third annual Startup Challenge.
Read the story  
2023 Challenge

Along with scholarship prizes, first and second place winning teams received consultation services from Dr. Karla Callahan and Dr. Darrell (Del) Mank, Missouri S&T graduates who have shared their insights and expertise as consultants to several successful startups.
Read the story  
2022
2022 Challenge

Winning teams of the 2022 Startup Challenge won a free one-year membership for each team member to TREX Downtown in addition to their scholarships.
See the winning teams