Teen Founder Wannabes Learn Pitch Decks While Schools Leave a ‘Ghastly Hole’

At 17, Merlin Mani already runs a miniature version of *Dragons’ Den* from her London secondary school. She dreams of launching a technology company, yet her vision sharply diverges from the Silicon Valley playbook she studies. “If I were Elon Musk,” she says flatly, “I’d give some of that money to charity.”

Mani’s generation stands at a strange crossroads. Startup culture glamorizes young founders, but shrinking internship pipelines and AI-driven automation keep actual entry points tightly sealed. This week, she joined a five-day London bootcamp designed specifically for 16- to 18-year-olds: an intervention built by angel investors Deborah Gruenberger and Isobel McDermott-Spencer, who watched conventional pathways into the industry evaporate. They call the resulting void a “ghastly hole” for under-18s.

School offers scant tech education, Mani explains, and securing work placements while juggling exam prep borders on impossible. The problem compounds as startups shed junior roles, letting algorithms swallow routine tasks that once gave newcomers a foothold. Gruenberger and McDermott-Spencer’s course, launched last summer, tackles both the mechanics of company building and the investor mindset. Entrepreneurs and VCs cycle through to share war stories. On Friday, students will hear a live pitch from healthtech startup Zonova Technologies, then decide whether they would write a check themselves.

Zonova CEO Georgia Fleet confesses the prospect rattles her. “Pitching to teenagers is pretty scary, though I did close a seed round recently so I’m the most practiced I’ve ever been.” Fleet acknowledges that lab-based firms like hers demand at least three months before new hires become productive, leaving little room for school-age recruits.

Data backs the founders’ concerns. A Federation of Small Businesses survey found only 35% of young people reported receiving any enterprise education during secondary school; girls posted even lower numbers. Gruenberger cites a friend’s daughter who endured three interviews for a scoop-shop job. “Why is there even one interview for this?” she asks.

The political landscape may shift. New UK prime minister Andy Burnham has pledged that secondary pupils will soon study subjects such as manufacturing and AI, with locally linked courses rolling out from Year 10 to create clearer workforce pathways.

Female representation remains another frontier. Mani senses that women founders must exert twice the effort to earn equal recognition. “When it comes to this industry, you think of tech bros first,” she says. Next year she plans to study mathematics at university, a discipline she believes will endure regardless of AI’s trajectory. A rapid decline in software engineering roles does not alarm her: “That’s fine, because I don’t like coding.”

Gruenberger and McDermott-Spencer see their program as a deliberate talent pipeline for young women who might otherwise self-select out. Mani, for her part, remains resolute about building a company on her own terms, channelling ambition without mimicking the founders she critiques. She wants the empire. She just wants to build it differently.