Business Strategy and Intrapreneurship

Course Syllabus here:APS1061H, Summer 2026

Instructor:     Professor Steve Treiber

e-mail: steve.treiber@utoronto.ca

APS1061, “Business Strategy and Intrapreneurship”, Pre-recorded lectures and In-person & simultaneous on-line collaborative course.  If you want to lead a business some day this is the course for you.  Every business executive and entrepreneur will encounter complex business problems they must urgently solve.  COVID19, SARS and 9/11 are extreme examples of unpredictable events that can destroy a business. Leveraging some of the problem-solving skills that you have learned during your engineering education, this course teaches how to define, solve and communicate the solution to a complex business problem using an engineering approach.   Each year we use an unsolved business problem published in newspapers such as the Wall Street Journal as the source of our challenge problem.  In 2026 it's OpenAI. What's it all about?. APS1061 course syllabus here.

Students will work in groups to develop a solution to the challenge business problem.  The groups will be given a package of material that identifies the problem in the first class and all groups will come up with their own definition and solution during the course. The inaugural problem, 2018, was how Walmart should respond to Amazon.  In 2026 the challenge business problem is OpenAI. When OpenAI was founded as a not for profit company in 2015 by Elon Musk and Sam Altman it was a new idea, with no competition.  Now the field is full of competitors and the costs of performance have accelrated far beyond the revenue returns possible in the short term.  Our objective is to develop a business strategy and plan that will bring this business to successful profitability.

Classes WB219 and simultaneously on ZOOM, May 4-8, 2026, 6-9pm every day; May 19-22, 2026, 6-9pm every day; and May 29, 6-9pm.  Enrollment begins April 8, 2026.