Did you hear Brad Burke, Managing Director of the Rice Alliance for Technology & Entrepreneurship, on the BusinessMakers Radio Show this past Saturday?
He was talking to Russ Capper and John Beddow about this year’s Rice University Business Plan Competition. This year 36 teams are competing for $600,000 in cash and prizes. That $600,000 includes:
$225,000 Grand Prize, including
– $125,000 Cash Investment Prize
– $20,000 Cash
– $80,000 In-kind Awards
$100,000 Investment in Life Science Company
– Includes Medical Devices, Diagnostics, Drugs, Biotech, and Others
$100,000 Investment in Technology Company, includes:
– Energy and Clean Tech/IT/Nano/Aerospace and Aviation
$20,000 Dow Sustainability Award
$20,000 NASA Earth/Space Life Science Innovation Award
There’s still time for university teams to be considered for the 2008 competition. You have until this Friday, February 22nd to submit your online intent to compete form and your executive summary of your business plan. All of the details are on the website.
This year’s competition kicks off on Thursday, April 3rd with the Elevator Pitch Competition, where all 36 teams will have 1 minute to present their elevator pitch. The semi-finals are on Friday and the finals are on Saturday, followed by the awards banquet.
I’ll be a judge again this year and will once again be live-blogging from Rice. Karen Love, one of my fellow Directors at PKF Texas, will be judging the Elevator Pitch Competition.
While there are other university sponsored business plan competitions, none are as large or as rich as the Rice Business Plan Competition. There will be teams competing from universities all over the world.
Check out the website, http://www.alliance.rice.edu/alliance/RBPC.asp if you have any questions. Good luck to all those who enter, I’ll see you on April 3rd!