Overview

Submit pre-approval applications before you spend the funds, anytime during the duration of the course or program, and no later than one (1) week before the last day of class/program.
Spend funds before the last day of class/program
Submit your Final Reimbursement Form before four (4) weeks after the last day of class/program.

Important dates

The Stanford Graduate School of Business, in collaboration with Doerr School of Sustainability, administers Venture Experiment Funds to help ease the financial burden of meeting learning goals in certain team-based experiential entrepreneurship courses and programs that employ a hypothesis-driven entrepreneurship framework.

Through this fund, you can apply for partial (80%) reimbursement of project expenses that you incur as you run experiments during the course or program. Also see the tax considerations below.

How much can I be reimbursed?

Maximum team reimbursement = $1000 per team, per quarter

Remember, we reimburse at a rate of 80%.

Process for Accessing Funds

1. Read the guidelines on this page. Select ONE member of your team to incur all the expenses.

2. Submit the Pre-approval Application. (*see guidance below, as some expenses do not require pre-approval)

3. Run your experiment and collect receipts as you go.

4. Submit an the Receipt Submission Form.

5. Wait for the reimbursement to show up in your Stanford account (usually is completed a few weeks after the quarter ends)

$1000

Tax Considerations:

Reimbursements are provided as stipends to the student who incurred the expense. Stipends are considered taxable income unless the student has and claims a tax treaty with Stanford, which is based on the country of citizenship.

For international students:

Stanford will take 14% federal withholding on all taxable stipends paid to non-U.S. citizens from non-tax treaty countries. Here is the information on the University website. There are some countries which have tax treaties and the student can request an exemption. If you are from a treaty country, and you have submitted Form W-8BEN to Payroll to claim the treaty benefit, then there is no tax withholding. (Please inquire here about your country’s tax treaty). Also keep in mind that the taxes are withheld as a courtesy. It is common that at the end of the calendar year the student receives this funding back in the form of an IRS tax refund.

We CAN Reimburse:

Prototyping supplies
Website development
Interviewee/User acquisition (e.g. gift cards) - $300 limit applies
Ad spends (e.g. Facebook, Google, etc.) - $400 limit applies
Travel for accessing target customers (e.g. trade shows, conferences or to conduct market research). There are a lot of caveats with travel, so please come talk to us if you're thinking about travelling.
Labor from independent contractors (come talk to us first)
Not sure? Ask us!

We CANNOT Reimburse:

Any alcohol, or drugs, or anything that is illegal in any U.S. state
Meals for team members
Phone calls or videoconferencing (use free options)
Office equipment
Survey software (use a GoogleForm or Qualtrics instead)
Logo design
Incorporation fees or legal charges
Gift cards that would be used to pay for the service/product you are building (clever! but not allowed)
Costs incurred by or on behalf of team members not enrolled in the course
Expenses incurred for a course you have dropped
Expenses that have already been incurred without pre-approval

Prototyping supplies under $100
Website hosting under $200
Website domains under $100
Interviewee/User acquisition (e.g. gift cards) under $100
Ad spend under $200

By default, the Pre-approval Form is required for any expense. However, there are some expenses that do not require pre-approval, and only the Final Reimbursement Form is needed:

What Can be Reimbursed?

Your experiment should align with one of the five learning goals listed below.

For products and services that offer weekly/monthly subscriptions (e.g. LinkedIn Premium, Canva, etc.), Venture Experiment Funds will only reimburse the weeks/months of the eligible class or program. For most classes and programs, this means you are eligible to be reimbursed for a max of 3 months of the service. Moreover, Venture Experiment Funds cannot be used to reimburse activities beyond the duration of the class or program. For example, if your program ends in August, you cannot be reimbursed for subscription fees for September. For products and services that only offer annual subscriptions, with no weekly/monthly subscription option, those will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis during the pre-approval process.

For Subscription-based Expenses: