Weary of the solitary struggle that comes with being a student-founder, two students jumped on the opportunity to create a social network of entrepreneurs — with a focus on those who have businesses up and running — where students can meet other business-founders, foster connections and find mentors.

“ExitSC,” a new entrepreneurs’ club on campus, facilitates students’ “exit” from the monotonous rat-race structure of student-life in college, said George Zhou, a member of the first ExitSC cohort and a senior majoring in arts, technology, and the business of innovation.

The organization aims to lighten the workload of student CEOs by connecting them with student and alumni mentors who have the experience and knowledge to help them solve business problems together.

“USC is one of the most entrepreneurial active campuses in the country, and this allows for the attraction [toward] venture capitalists, investors and people in the industry that are always looking for young talent, who don’t want to go through incubators and accelerators to find that talent,” Zhou said.

While several entrepreneurial clubs and incubator-like opportunities already exist on campus, ExitSC aims to move away from early-stage business expansion and instead serve as an ecosystem for students who are past the phases of ideation and product design, Zhou said.

“What we’re doing is we’re bringing together the 20 busiest people on campus,” said Josh Brennan, co-founder of ExitSC and a senior majoring in arts, technology and the business of innovation. “These are people that are working more than full-time jobs by founding a company, while also trying to maintain being a student.” 

The club convened its first cohort of student founders in September. Brennan said he and his co-founder Sebastian Bustamante have had the opportunity to “play matchmaker” and connect founders with one another to create mentor-mentee opportunities.

“It’s something that we realize everyone wants. … All the founders want to meet new founders. All the alumni want to help mentor these founders,” Brennan said.

Bustamante, a senior majoring in business administration, described ExitSC as a social network where students can meet fellow entrepreneurs to foster genuine connections with others who can learn from and lean on one another to develop their respective businesses.

“ExitSC gives [students] a fast track to success, because it allows you, the most exclusive access to the best alumni [and] the best founders at USC,” Zhou said.

Bustamante said ExitSC has become a “community of builders,” connected by a love for problem-solving and experience in the entrepreneurial world. The organization aims to bring these student and alumni-founders together in hopes that they will collaborate, making it easier to build their businesses.

“One of the biggest problems of being a founder in this day and age, especially post-grad, is that it’s really lonely,” Brennan said. “You don’t necessarily have a ton of co-workers or an office space. It’s more of [a] personal journey.” 

The first cohort of the organization is composed of students who run businesses in industries including biotechnology, app development, consumer packaged goods and more. Brennan’s app-studio company is in the process of creating a new “modern-version” of the bible, “Bible BFF”, while Bustmante’s work at Galatea Bio involves consolidating medical research to boost the productivity of pharmaceutical companies.

“We’re cultivating a group of people that didn’t want to take the easy route,” Brennan said. “They wanted to take this less promised route. And they tried over and over again, and they finally failed their way forward into something that’s going to make a real impact.” 

Professors Albert Napoli at the Lloyd Greif Center for Entrepreneurial Studies and India Wright at the Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism have helped Brennan and Bustamante create connections within the community and secure guest speakers for ExitSC.

“[The professors have] also just all been so excited about it,” Brennan said. “A lot of the professors come to USC, not because they’re trying to be a researcher, but because they’re trying to help the next generation succeed.” 

The founders have also been in contact with alumni who are brought on board to become guest speakers, provide mentorship and offer venture capital opportunities for students in ExitSC. 

After starting his brand “Buffs” —  a beef-puff protein snack company — a year ago, Zhou said his business has become his main focus while everything else has become secondary. 

“That’s the life,” Zhou said. “We’re looking for people [who] really are devoting 1000% to what they’re building.”

Brennan said the founders hope that members will derive value from the opportunities ExitSC provides and see tangible improvements in their businesses.

“We [have] a group of 20 founders who are all making real waves in their industry, who are all going to be making this insane impact on the world and are going to be shaping the next generation of business,” Brennan said.