About DeSIC

The Dedan Kimathi University of Technology University Management, in fulfilment of the University’s strategic plan and with the goal of making DeKUT an entrepreneurial University, established the DeKUT Startup and Incubation Centre (DeSIC).   

Through the established entrepreneurial ecosystem, DeKUT endeavours to promote the potential of Startups to create jobs, commercialize new technologies, and strengthen the national economy. Thus, the DeKUT Startup Centre will provide an ecosystem that promotes the identification, enrolment, support, acceleration and establishment of startups to contribute to the attainment of national goals.  

The Dedan Kimathi University of Technology Start-up and Incubation Centre (DeSIC) is critical to creating and growing new ventures in the University ecosystem for the staff and students. They help new innovators and entrepreneurs develop their ideas, provide them with mentorship, support, and other resources, and ultimately help them create sustainable businesses. 

To create a more cohesive environment for entrepreneurs to operate, share ideas and solutions and, ultimately, improve their chances of success and to enhance collaboration between the two centres DeStaC and DeHUB were merged in May 2023 to form the now DeSIC.  

At DeSIC, we work to support all the start-ups incubated at the Centre to produce quality products, help the founders penetrate the market and equip them with skills and knowledge to remain relevant in the market.  

At DeSIC, we help start-ups apply information, imagination and skills in deriving greater or different values from resources and all processes by which new ideas are generated and converted into useful products. We help founders access experienced mentors and coaches and entrepreneurs access the best of talent, technology and expertise from Dedan Kimathi University of Technology such as Legal, Intellectual Property, Valuation and Customer Development. DeSIC provides an ecosystem that promotes the identification, enrolment, support, acceleration and establishment of startups to contribute to attaining national goals. Through DeSIC, the University supports and takes viable startups through the acceleration process and graduates them into financially viable and freestanding companies. 

At DeSIC,  we take you through the process of building to launching a startup through the ecosystem that has been built by the University. 

DeHUB

The Dedan Kimathi University Center for Innovation and Incubation (DeHUB) is tasked to support all the ideas incubated at the centre to produce quality products, help the innovators penetrate the market and equip them with skills and knowledge to remain relevant in the market. DeHUB centres its operations around; the incubation of ideas, mentoring of incubatees through meetups, training and hosting competitive hackathons that give and equip the innovators with the necessary skills to turn their ideas into businesses and continue the culture of brainstorming and creative thinking. The hub was launched in March 2015 to support innovations up to commercialization. Although situated in the University, it supports innovations from people around the Mt. Kenya region. The hub has supported over 100 start-ups over the years. Our mission & vision is to be a world-class Centre for inspiring creativity, nurturing and commercialization of innovations. The objectives of DeHUB are to; nurture and develop ideas or innovations into start-ups, foster a unique, collaborative, and entrepreneurial culture, establish a platform for the speedy commercialization of innovations, promote national development through the creation and development of new enterprises and build the capacity of different stakeholders through mentorship and training

DeStaC 

The Dedan Kimathi University of Technology Start-Up Centre was formed to enhance innovation and research commercialization at the University. Among the objectives of DeStaC is to enhance the entrepreneurial ecosystem in the University, where innovators will find an avenue to commercialize their ideas and launch startup companies.  Further, DeStaC will provide a support process that accelerates the successful development of start-ups and fledgling companies by providing an array of targeted resources and services. Consequently, DeStaC will provide a mentorship platform for you to scale up your startup. This framework will enable the University to support and take viable startups through the acceleration process and graduate them into financially viable and freestanding companies. These objectives are attained by providing adequate incubation spaces and facilities for the start-ups, offering consulting services to the incubated start-ups, linking start-ups with investment partners and offering training to the incubated start-ups on various aspects of business

DeKUT Startup Cycle 

The DeKUT Startup Centre (DeStaC) has been mandated to oversee the full startup cycle (see Fig 1) towards commercialization of innovation, protection of intellectual property (IP), up to the support of startup companies through mentorship and ultimately scaling up. Looking at the research work taking place in the faculties, it may be classified largely as pure or applied research. But in order to develop commercially viable products or innovations, which can be termed as the minimum viable product (MVP), commercial research and development are imperative. A minimum viable product (MVP) is a version of a product or innovation, with just enough features to be usable by early customers as a commercial product, who can then provide feedback for future product development. Once this MVP is established, IP protection is sought through a patent. Finally, the Startup Company is established, to support the commercialization of innovation. DeStaC has embarked on this journey and has vetted a number of innovations, of which, some have been admitted to the Startup Centre for commercialization support.

Figure 1: The DeKUT Startup Cycle for commercialization of innovations