Budding student entrepreneurs from Cambridge joined up with undergraduates from four other UK universities and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology for an innovative course on the basics of entrepreneurship.

During CMI Connections, an intensive week-long course held at the University of Durham, the students came up with a variety of new business ideas - including conducting market research over the internet, setting up an 'extreme ski-ing' travel company, and using 3D technology to find a way to make high-fashion shoes fit better.

They are now being encouraged to continue to work on these ideas as they go back to their respective universities, which include Oxford, Strathclyde, Durham and Ulster.

In total 70 students took part in the course, coached by UK and US entrepreneurs and facilitators from the participating universities. CMI Connections was led by Shai Vyakarnam from the Cambridge Entrepreneurship Centre, and Anthony Ives from the MIT Entrepreneurship Center.

The event was supported by the Cambridge-MIT Institute - the partnership between Cambridge and MIT which carries out education and research designed to boost competitiveness, productivity and entrepreneurship. The course aimed, said Anthony Ives, to encourage among participants "more confidence, a different spirit and attitude towards taking a risk, and a greater network".

Some of the students who came had already set up their own businesses: Ross Barraclough, 19, from the University of Strathclyde, has recently set up his own landscape gardening company and came to the course hoping to gain ideas about how to develop the business.

Others wanted to work on not-for-profit and social initiatives, including Durham undergraduate Daniel Chin who plans to use his new-found skills to develop an idea for a fair-trade clothing company.

Alex Swallow, who is studying politics at Cambridge, says, "I thought the course was extremely useful. I didn't have that many prior expectations but it proved to be more fun, and less solely business-orientated, than I had imagined. My project, which concerns trying to improve road safety in Cambridge, was something that I have been thinking about for a long time. But the course will give me extra impetus to see it achieved, especially after having met so many inspirational entrepreneurs. I hope it has taught me a few lessons which I can carry with me."

Shai Vyakarnam said: "Over the course of the week, it was great to see a disparate group of students, some of whom were rather sceptical at the start, turning into people who are more confident of their ability to turn an idea - however modest or ambitious - into a real enterprise."

He added: "We are now hoping to develop this model to run more such courses for students here in Cambridge."

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