Stanford University
Want to be an entrepreneur? Here are top 20 colleges for aspiring entrepreneurs.IBM, Facebook and Apple, three of the most well-known IT firms today have one thing in common – they were founded by college dropouts.
While this may fuel the myth that a college education is not necessary, many college graduates too have gone on to establish flourishing companies.
If you’re a budding entrepreneur, your choice of educational institutions for higher learning is important. Colleges like Stanford University and the University of California, Berkeley have an expansive alumni network of entrepreneurs.
Based on the number of companies founded by alumni and the number of graduates who launched venture-backed companies, a financial data and software company, PitchBook has published a list of the top universities for VC-backed entrepreneurs.
Stanford University leads this list. The university has 378 founders as part of their alumni network. There are 309 companies worldwide that were founded by Stanford graduates.
These companies raised a total of $3.5 billion in venture capital. Stanford University was followed by the University of California, Berkeley and MIT.
The Indian Institute of Technology was ranked 4th. The institute is the first non-US school to find a spot amongst the top 7 positions. Last year, they were ranked at no. 10. The IIT alumni network has 264 founders who have set up a total of 205 companies and raised over $3,150 million of capital.
Ranked at no. 9, the Tel Aviv University from Israel was the only other non-US university to find a spot in the top 10 positions. The university has 169 founders in its alumni list. These graduates have founded 141 companies and raised over $1,253 million of capital.
Another Israeli school, Technion-Machon Technologi Le’ Israel found a spot on the top 20 list. They were ranked at the 18th position. Technion has 119 founders on the alumni list who have established 98 companies and raised over $797 million in capital.
| Rank | School | Alumni Entrepreneurs | Companies Founded | Capital raised ($M) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Stanford | 378 | 309 | 3519 |
| 2 | UC Berkeley | 336 | 284 | 2412 |
| 3 | MIT | 300 | 250 | 2417 |
| 4 | IIT | 264 | 205 | 3150 |
| 5 | Harvard | 253 | 229 | 3235 |
| 6 | U. of Pennsylvania | 244 | 221 | 2194 |
| 7 | Cornell | 212 | 190 | 1971 |
| 8 | University of Michigan | 176 | 158 | 1159 |
| 9 | Tel Aviv University | 169 | 141 | 1253 |
| 10 | University of Texas | 150 | 137 | 1298 |
| 11 | Yale | 149 | 132 | 2073 |
| 12 | University of Illinois | 146 | 131 | 1411 |
| 13 | Carnegie Mellon | 142 | 123 | 1080 |
| 14 | UCLA | 130 | 118 | 1298 |
| 15 | Brown | 127 | 110 | 1308 |
| 16 | U. of Waterloo | 122 | 96 | 1008 |
| 17 | Princeton | 119 | 115 | 1041 |
| 18 | Technion | 119 | 98 | 797 |
| 19 | Columbia | 115 | 105 | 952 |
| 20 | U. of Wisconsin | 111 | 103 | 832 |
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