OUr Story

After years of seeing Detroit overlooked, the Detroit Entrepreneurship Network co-founders Aashka Soni and Ashley Lyles knew the city was fully of life and brimming with potential. They believed in Detroit’s revival and understood that entrepreneurship was a key in unlocking a better future for Detroit. They knew entrepreneurship brings new innovations, opportunies, and more productivity which allows local businesses to flourish.

How do you inspire entrepreneurship? They asked this question and came to an innovative solution. They saw that by providing an entrepreneurial-based education and community to Detroit-area high schoolers, they could harness the energy, creativity, and potential in our community’s youth. They belived that empowering high schoolers to start their own businesses, they could help students gain the critical skills necessary to be the successful future leaders their community will depend on. Passionate about the idea, they founded the Detroit Enterpreneurship Network in 2012.

After a small pilot run in Farmington Hills of what is now our Startup program, Aashka and Ashley wanted to scale their idea to offer the program to kids across Detroit and the surrounding metropolitan area. They joined optiMize at the University of Michigan to help build their idea into a real organization. At that time was a fledgling Michigan club, optiMize challenged students to create projects that make a positive impact. They pitched DEN and became optiMize Social Innovation Challenge finalists. With the funding they were awarded, they expanded DEN and offered admission to students from across metro Detroit.

Over the years, we’ve continued to build on Aashka and Ashley’s original vision by expanding our network’s programs, events, and resources. Aashka and Ashley knew the best way to support Detroit’s revival was to start with its youth. DEN has kept that commitment to our Detroit-area students by helping hundreds of aspiring high school entrepreneurs start their own businesses. DEN has hosted over 50 workshops among other networking events and pitch competitions. From its humble beginnings, DEN has grown from a student organization at the University of Michigan to a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization.

As DEN continues expands, our mission has and will always remain the same: to support youth enterprenuership.

On March 26th, 2018 the Detroit Entrepreneurship Network became a nonprofit corporation.

On May 18th, 2018, the Detroit Entrepreneurship Network became recognized by the IRS as a 501(c)(3) public charity.