Trace founders back to campus

Interactive demo

Explore the people connecting a university to its companies

University Desk connects Oxford, Cambridge and TU Delft to founders with recorded education links and the companies they built. Follow a connection to inspect the founder’s education record and company details, or switch to the company list to filter and shortlist.

This is a saved, funding-ranked sample, not a census or a list of university spinouts. Each network starts with up to 100 company candidates and retains founders whose education records contain the exact university UUID. An education link does not establish degree completion.

Download the app source

The app ZIP includes the dashboard, setup instructions and the existing demo snapshots. It runs without credentials; notes and shortlists stay in your browser. The Python download below is a separate API example, not the application, and requires your own API credentials.

The goal

Build a founder network you can audit

A university name is useful for discovery, but it is not enough evidence for a relationship. This workflow starts with a broad company search, then keeps an edge only when the founder's education record points to the resolved university UUID.

python -m venv .venv
source .venv/bin/activate
pip install requests python-dotenv
python map_university_founders.py --university "University of Oxford" --domain ox.ac.uk

Store DEALROOM_CLIENT_ID and DEALROOM_CLIENT_SECRET in a local .env file. Never expose them in browser code.

Resolve the institution before drawing an edge

GET /data/search can return institutions with similar names. The script requires both an exact name and website domain, then fetches GET /data/entities/{id} for the canonical UUID and university metrics.

search = client.get(
    "/data/search",
    {"q": university_name, "types": "university", "limit": 10},
)
match = next(
    item for item in rows(search)
    if item["name"] == university_name
    and domain(item.get("website_domain")) == website_domain
)

Keep alumni companies and spinouts separate

The university entity reports alumni-founder and spinout totals. These describe different populations.

Use the university label to build a candidate pool

GET /data/companies finds startups whose founder education names the university. Funding sort gives the network a useful starting order, while a larger pool leaves room for the verification step.

filter=and(
  founder_university_name[eq]:University of Oxford,
  has_founder[eq]:true,
  is_startup[eq]:true
)
sort=-total_funding
limit=60
currency=USD

The live Oxford run found 5,683 matching companies before verification. The public snapshot shows 12, ordered by reported total funding.

Verify people in batches, then add pedigree

Company rows include founder UUIDs. The script sends those UUIDs to GET /data/founders in batches of 50, avoiding one request per person.

education = next(
    item for item in founder.get("education", [])
    if item.get("university_uuid") == university["uuid"]
)

if education:
    keep_edge(company, founder, education)

The retained founder record adds degree, major, study years, prior employers, and profile links when those fields are available. Missing fields stay null.

Real output

Snapshot generated from the Dealroom API. Re-run the script for current data.

Treat the map as research evidence

• Education and career records can be incomplete, so absence is not evidence that a relationship does not exist.
• The university-name company filter is a discovery step. Verify the founder education UUID before retaining an edge.
• Funding totals, founder roles, and education records can update at different times.
• A company-level spinout flag does not identify the institution behind that spinout.
• Use the network to form research questions, not to judge founder quality or predict company outcomes.