Thanks to its proximity to the Tech Coast, the Paul Merage School of Business at the University of California, Irvine (UCI), offers significant opportunities for students with an eye toward innovative business. An emphasis on innovation and business pioneering is built directly into what Merage calls its “visionary curriculum,” supplementing conventional business disciplines with three core, cross-disciplinary areas: strategic innovation, information technology, and analytical decision making.
In addition, several of Merage’s special course offerings and programs showcase the school’s commitment to putting students in contact with the rapidly shifting face of business. For example, students can customize their MBA experience by completing one of the three available certificates: Digital Transformation, Innovation and Entrepreneurship, and Real Estate and Urban Development. Through the school’s “Applied Consulting” course, students have the opportunity to gain hands-on experience with current business practices by working directly with locally based global companies for a ten-week period. Merage students can also participate each year in the university-wide New Venture Competition (formerly the Business Plan Competition), whose winners collectively claim a total of more than $100K in prizes and funding for their proposed start-up ventures.
