Consider Google, Facebook and Skype – these giants began with a good idea. The ideas themselves, though, were not unique. Many others had thought of a proper search engine, an improved social network, and Skype-like videophones have already appeared in 1930s sci-fi films.

So, contrary to accepted wisdom, the ideas themselves don’t matter that much. What does count is making them real. Yet, to create a hit ICT-product, technology alone doesn’t help either. It is crucial to understand the relevance and sustainability of a future product, to know its users‘ needs, to master product and business development, to be able to lead an effective team, to design and package the product, and to sell it. All this in an international marketplace.

But that’s exactly where most of today’s start-ups fail – they do not combine the multiple specialist skills into a singular dynamic process. And where to lay the blame when all those skills are taught separately? Technical colleges don’t talk about design, design courses ignore business and business schools avoid technology. This makes later teamwork in a workplace very difficult. Most higher learning today is also rather theoretical, creating a gap between the classroom and real life.

Our new Master’s Program DDVE (Design and Development of Virtual Environments) is a significant improvement in the learning process. The industry provided us with extensive feedback about its needs, and there was a thorough analysis of many international educational programs and concepts (our favorite authors are Steve Blank and Eric Ries). The result is DDVE – an entrepreneurial Master’s Program without precedent. It is both inter-disciplinary and practical, and, it teaches cutting edge international product and business development. Who is going to create the next Facebook and Skype? It could be you! Join DDVE to change the world!

The extremely varied backgrounds of our students provides the opportunity to create a new quality out of cooperation and teamwork. Unique, even in a global sense we combine three different fields into a single program:

- Design Thinking
- Product Development
- User Interface Design
- Usability & UX
- Prototyping
- User Testing
- New Platforms
- Mash-up
- Lean & Scrum
- Cloud Solutions
- Open Source
- Tech Trends
- Business Development
- Teamwork & Team Leadership
- Sales & Marketing
- Financing & VC
- International Law for Start-ups
- Intellectual Property Rights

Most of our studies consist of practical product development projects initiated by the students themselves as well as by different companies and NGOs. Guided by industry professionals real-life problems are tackled and real-life feedback is given. The theoretical part of the program is designed to give direct support to the parallel practical activities. Knowledge obtained from the lectures is immediately applied to the students‘ own projects.

All DDVE’s theory and practice is put into a global context. Every start-up should look further from their home market. You’ll learn to lead international teams, deal with international sales and networking. All our lecturers and mentors have international experience. The official langugage of the program is English.