Start-up Fund
For many studying or working at UvA, taking time out to work on a start-up or innovation will be a considerable effort and require investment. To help ease this first hurdle, we offer a loan or investment of 2,500 EUR. This money can be used for a variety of things; from testing your marketing strategy, to building a tool, to designing a website. Innovations are selected following application rounds every quarter. In particular, students who have joined the Justice Entrepreneurship course are invited to apply to the fund. The best ideas are then chosen by an independent board. Importantly, funding also comes with free mentoring through our Market Impact programme.
Application criteria
Is your idea eligible for the investment?
- Solves a justice or legal problem.
This doesn’t have to be something that a lawyer will use, but rather a solution which focuses on a problem experienced by anyone interacting with the law or the bodies that operate within it.
- Uses technology to facilitate the solution.
Involving technology in your solution is more likely to make it scalable and gives it greater impact.
- Can become an organisation or business which is financially sustainable.
No, this isn’t Shark Tank and we aren’t going to demand equity in your business.
- Has already started its development.
This means, we want to see that you have found- or started to look for team members, that the idea has been researched with real users/clients (proof of concept) and/or that you have a first version of a prototype.
- You are a University of Amsterdam student, researcher or recent alumni (no more than 2 years after graduation).
You do not need to be a law student or researcher. Your team members can be from any other institution, but, seeing as our fund is backed by our University, we unfortunately cannot fund ideas created entirely by non-students/employees of the UvA.
How to apply
Once we have received your application, we will invite you to complete our selection process. Selections for start-up funds by the Evaluation Committee are made on a quarterly basis, this includes:
(a) first check if you fulfil the criteria
(b) follow-up questions
(c) interviews
(d) final assessment by our Evaluation Committee
Evaluation of the application
How will your idea be evaluated?
Financing
Because we want your businesses to be financially independent, we offer our funding on the basis of a loan for those who develop a for-profit initiative. This means that if your business starts generating revenue within 3 years, you have to pay back the 2500 EUR (without interest). However, it is important to emphasise that we don’t expect you to be able to repay us immediately, and nor will we demand our investment back if your idea comes up against insurmountable challenges. Non-profit initiatives are exempt from paying back their investment.
Awarded start-ups
In the past, the Law Hub has already funded promising initiatives. We are still working closely with a number of these start-ups.
