Workshop on design thinking at Startup Village

As part of a transnational programme to scale up technological solutions to modern challenges, entrepreneurs from select portfolio companies across the world along with mentors will visit the Startup Village at Kochi on Wednesday. Their programme includes a workshop on design thinking and interactive session with Freeman Murray, entrepreneur, angel investor and mentor from the US.

The team includes Megan Smith, vice president Google [x] at Google Inc; Matt Mullenweg, founder of WordPress; and Unreasonable at Sea founder Daniel Epstein, and its director - International Partnerships Cynthia Yeung.

'Unreasonable At Sea' is an initiative of the US-based Unreasonable Institute in partnership with Semester at Sea. Launched in January this year, it is an international accelerator for tech entrepreneurs that will enable Semester at Sea students to study entrepreneurship while tackling the world's most pressing issues with those who are actually doing the work. Participants will have the opportunity to sail, work and learn from some of the world's most renowned innovators and mentors.

The inaugural programme has been hosted on Semester at Sea's shipboard campus as it sails more than 25,000 nautical miles around the globe to 14 international destinations. In each country, including India, Spain, South Africa, China and Japan, entrepreneurs will explore the local economies and experiment in taking their technology to market. Students of the programme will learn about the process through coursework and in-country field excursions.

Throughout the course of the voyage, the selected 11 companies are to sail, live, learn from, and be mentored by 20 of the world's most prominent innovators and entrepreneurs. Xbox and SAP are among the companies that have joined this initiative.

The group comprises teams from 10 countries and 5 continents. Their expertise ranges from astrophysics to artificial intelligence, from biological, mechanical, software, medical and electrical engineers to graphic designers, industrial designers, scientists, doctors, and operational masterminds.