Boldbrain challenge

Ever think to turn into a reality your great idea?

Win a USI EMBA Scholarship by Participating in the Boldbrain Startup Challenge!

Boldbrain Startup Challenge, a leading accelerator in Ticino for early-stage startups and entrepreneurs, is now accepting applications. This program is designed to nurture innovative ideas, providing personalized support, coaching, workshops, and a comprehensive three-month training program.

Participants will compete for cash prizes totaling CHF 120,000 and over CHF 80,000 in in-kind prizes. This is a golden opportunity to develop your startup idea into a profitable business in Ticino.

Key Details:

• Open to: Startups and early-stage ideas from any sector, including international applicants planning to develop their idea in Ticino.
• Application Deadline: June 14, 11:50 PM.
• InfoDay Event: May 16 at Ristorante Vistalago, Lugano.

For more information and to download the regulations, visit the official Boldbrain website.

Check out the past edition’s winners! 

Negotiation – An essential skill for executives

When: 25 May (08:30 – 12:30)

Where: USI Executive Center, Blue Room

Professor: Kandarp Mehta

For an executive negotiation is not a choice, it’s a necessity. As a result it’s essential for a manager to work on his/her negotiation skill. In this session, through a practical simulation we will try to understand some of the most important aspects of negotiation skill of a manager. Negotiations involve a dual pressure for an executive. On one hand the executive is under pressure to compete and create maximum value, on the other hand the executive wants to collaborate and establish a relationship. Quite often negotiations involve not only opportunities for creation of value but also a resolution of a conflict or a deadlock. This session will address this competitive-collaborative pressure that each manager faces.

The session will provide practical tools and tips that managers can use in their day-to-day negotiations and become more effective.

Come join us at the Executive Center, 25 May

Limited places, book now at emba@usi.ch

Kandarp Mehta BIO

Kandarp Mehta is a PhD from IESE Business School, Barcelona.

He has been with the Entrepreneurship Department at IESE since October 2009.

His research has focused on creativity in organizations and negotiations. He frequently works as consultant with startups on issues related to Innovation and Creativity. His doctoral thesis was about the process of creativity in the context of motion picture industry.

He has conducted several Negotiation and Creativity Workshops for corporate executives and management students in Europe, USA and India. Before coming to Spain, he was at ICFAI Business School in India where he taught Corporate Finance. He is also actively involved with Creative Industries.

Inauguration of the USI House of Sustainability in Airolo

Take advantage of this opportunity and book your free session for the upcoming module.

Course: Finance

Professor Laurent Frésard

When: 10 March, from 08:30 to 12:30.
Where: Blue Room, Executive Center

Course Description and goals

This course teaches the logic underlying the firm’s financial decisions: investment, financing, and payout policies. The main themes will be:
What is corporate finance and what is corporate governance?
Understand financial statements and the concept of value
Understand Cash-flows and master the concept of discounting and be able to apply it in various situations
Understand the trade-off between risk and return and apply it to determine firms’ cost of capital
Understand how firms select investment projects and decide on their sources of financing
Analyze how the “digital” and “sustainability” revolutions affect these topics

Book your session: emba@usi.ch

Take advantage of this opportunity and book your free session for the upcoming course.

Early bird discount of 10% on the total fee valid until end of June.

Course: Marketing (10-11.02) , USI, Executive Center, Blue Room

Watch the video of Professor Luca Visconti

Luca M. Visconti is Full Professor of Marketing at IMCA (Institute of Marketing and Communication) and at ESCP Europe, Paris.
He is Lecturer at IFM (Institut Français de la Mode) and Sciences Po, Paris.
Since September 2020, he is Dean of the Faculty of Communication, Culture and Society.
Prior to his current appointment, he was Full Professor at ESCP Europe (2011-2017) and Lecturer in Marketing at Università Bocconi (1999-2011), where he received his Ph.D. in Business Administration and Management. He has been Visiting Scholar at Leeds School of Management, University of Colorado (2004-2005), and at École Supérieure des Affaires, Université de Lille2, Lille (2007-2008 and 2010).

His research inspects the intersections of consumption, markets, and culture (Consumer Culture Theory). In particular, his work focuses on branding, luxury, storytelling, market vulnerability, and wellbeing. His work appears in high-ranked journals (Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Marketing Management, Marketing Theory, etc.), books, and book chapters.

Course Description and goals

The course aims to present what marketing is, its approach to both business and  consumer markets, and the emergence of the customer journey framework. In particular, it clarifies how customer orientation unfolds in times of branding,  digitalisation, and fragmentation of customer value.
The course combines critical thinking with hands-on, practical knowledge, which are organised around the key components of a marketing plan.

The course combines e-learning and in presence pedagogy, and alternates frontal discussion with team working activities. Participants are invited to share their own experience and views, in light of an approach to marketing that is meant to be critical, interpretive, and sensitive to societal concerns. It also integrates
presentations from expert marketing managers, to alternate theoretical and practical knowledge.

Book your place: emba@usi.ch