Founder lunches
A table, a dozen grad students, and someone who has already done it. The parts of the story that never make it into a talk — the co-founder split, the first customer, the year it nearly died.
Lab2Launch
Lab2Launch is a student-led community of graduate researchers at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign who want to take their work beyond publications and prototypes. Built by students, for students. We bring together curious minds who are ready to explore entrepreneurship, commercialization, and real-world impact.
Who is this for?
If you're curious about entrepreneurship, or about making more impact with your research, this is for you. No membership, no application, no pitch deck required. We want to create a low-pressure environment to learn and to meet others who are interested in the same things.
Event formats so far
Fireside chats
One guest, one interviewer, no slides. Half structured conversation, half questions from the room — closer to an interview than a talk.
Startup seminars
Longer-form sessions with people running deep-tech companies, open to the whole department. Databases, petabyte analytics, quantum memory — the kind of company that starts as a research problem.
Our Sponsors
Laude InstituteLaude Institute backs researchers turning computer science work into companies. Their support makes our programming possible.
Help us grow
Open · Core team
Core team members
Run a program end to end — book speakers, host the lunches, decide where this goes next.
Open · Volunteers
Volunteers
Help core team with events: setup, photos, writing, outreach. The lowest-commitment way to meet the people in the room.