Exeter nominates student enterprise champion

The winners were chosen from the 90,000 students at the five SETsquared member universities of Bath, Bristol, Exeter, Southampton and Surrey. Nominations ranged from providing soup to the homeless to wave generated electricity, and from mobile apps to sex education lessons.

Exeter named Delie Kastner as its student enterprise champion for her work for the Exeter Entrepreneurs Society and for the ‘Sell My Book’ concept. This idea takes second hand textbooks and sells them to incoming students - a business idea which has done exceptionally well and now has a permanent presence across campus.

Commenting on her award, Delie said: “It is really cool to have won this award as I have received so much support from the Innovation Centre. I would love to make this my career and I now want to expand the Sell My Book idea into other Universities.”

Another Exeter student enterprise – UniSportOnline Limited – run by Tom Carrington Smith and Matt Brookland were highly commended in the Best Student Start-Up category.

“The SETsquared universities have come together to give students extra options for their future. These awards recognise that the spirit of entrepreneurship is thriving in our universities,” said Sean Fielding, Director of Research and Knowledge Transfer and member of the SETsquared management team.

“Starting your own company is not just a great experience for the students, it is good for the economy too. It was great to see some of our talented young entrepreneurs get recognised for their achievements”, he said.

As well as being able to meet with young entrepreneurs from other universities, the showcase provided an opportunity for students to bring their entrepreneurial ideas to a wider business audience including investors and business mentors.

A full list of entries can be found here on the SETsquared website.