Competition set to help start up student company

A group of investors, mostly alumni, have pooled their resources to give students with startup ideas a boost — a competition with professional feedback and a $250,000 prize to start their own company.

Building Entrepreneurs in Software and Technology is a competition for seniors and graduate students to submit business plans for a student-led company based on Internet and software technology.

The prize money for the winning plan — a sum of $100,000 to be put toward the winning students’ or student’s startup company — will be the largest in the world granted to students by a university for a business competition.
School of Informatics and Computing Dean Bobby Schnabel, who helped spearhead the formation of the competition, said there are several reasons students should submit their plans.

“If they actually dream of being an entrepreneur, then this is an incredible opportunity,” he said. “But also, this is a great experience, not only because they are exposing themselves, but they will be exposed to successful and helpful entrepreneur professionals who are already in the field.”

That exposure comes in the form of the 10 investors who created the $1.1 million to fund the competition for four years.

Nine of the 10 investors are alumni, and all are leaders or CEOs of their respective companies.

Investor Mary Delaney, an IU graduate and CEO of Luceo Solutions LLC, said the value of the competition extends beyond the monetary benefit.

“Whether you win or not, you still ‘win,’” Delaney said. “It’s not just the money. They get the funding, but they also get exposure and coaching from multiple levels. I’m just really excited to see the untapped potential of the students.”

The competition is in three tiers. The first deadline is Nov. 15, when contestants will submit a conceptual outline for their companies.

Initial business plans and presentations of selected teams will be announced by Feb. 3, 2012, and selected finalists will provide a final plan and a public presentation by mid-April 2012.

“It’s going to be so helpful, especially if we win,” said Neil Kelty, a senior business major and BEST contestant. “This could be a wonderful way to finance a startup company coming out of college and not having a whole lot of capital.”

He said he thinks BEST will give an extra push to entrepreneurial students leery of presenting their ideas.

“A lot of these students are the entrepreneurial type and have all these ideas in their mind but have never actually flushed them out,” Kelty said. “You can have the best idea in the world, but it means nothing if you can’t tell other people about it.”