From Classrooms to Start-up Ecosystems: The Role of B-Schools in Catalyzing Entrepreneurial Development

By Prof. Shilpi Jain, Dean Corporate Relation, FORE School of Management

The entrepreneurial ecosystem in the country, India, has undergone a rather intriguing transition over the past ‘decade’. The country now boasts an estimated 1,25,000 ‘start-ups’, including 110 ‘unicorns’, as of 2025, making it the world’s third-largest ‘start-up ecosystem’ by that time. The entrepreneurial ecosystem in the country, as stated, has seen an ‘alarming pace’ of change lately, largely driven by ‘policy action, investment, and, finally, a shift, so far, incremental, toward a change in management education’. The change, Interestingly, is being ‘led by a growing number of B-schools, which are morphing, as they should, into ‘entrepreneur breeding grounds’ spaces ‘moving away from, or even ditching, the classroom’ and ‘moving toward, or even ditching, theory’.

Management education is changing rapidly
The traditional approach to management education, prevalent even in the Indian scenario, was largely ...