Ventura, International Business Plan Competition from NIT Trichy, finals on 20th,21st February 2010

VENTURA, the annual International Business Plan Competition, organized by the Entrepreneurship Cell of NIT-Trichy, rolls out the final round of its 2010 edition on the 20th & 21st of this month. With the dynamic and indomitable support of the Department of Science and Technology,Government of India, and TREC-STEP (Tiruchirapalli Regional Engineering College Science and Technology Entrepreneurs’ Park),Ventura ’10 promises to surpass its previous versions and continue standing on its lofty position as India’s biggest Business Plan Competition.

Ventura, which started off in 2005 as an initiative of the Entrepreneurship Cell, serving as a platform for budding innovative ideas and to promote the spirit of entrepreneurship among the students

of NIT Trichy. Glancing back, Ventura became truly international last year, as teams from universities in UK, Sweden, USA competed for the honors. Ventura ’09 attracted participation of 244 students from 120 institutions across 15 nations. With a 50-strong mentor network consisting of path breaking entrepreneurs, venture capitalists, angel investors and pioneers of innovation, Ventura is the ideal forum for rising entrepreneurs to showcase their innovations.

Ventura consists of three stages: The first round is the submission of a brief executive summary. The teams must submit an abstract covering various aspects of their business plan. The qualifying teams go on to the mentoring round, where they are guided to channelize and improve their plans. The final round of Ventura ‘10 is a combination of two presentations by the short-listed teams. The first of these is an Elevator Pitch (duration 2 minutes) before the jury panel. Then each team delivers a detailed and elaborate presentation of its business plan, specifying the relevance and requirement of their product or service, in the present and future global market. It is followed by a grilling question round where the judges question the plans' validity.

Points are awarded for innovation, financial stability and overall competence of the plan and the team.

Ventura’09 witnessed intense competition for the first prize of Rs. 1.25 lakh, with incubation funding to the tune of Rs. 40 lakh. The winning team, CardioCure, from GeorgiaTech (USA), proposed to manufacture unique low cost implantable devices for heart ailments in developing countries. SeriesTech, the first runner-up from Lund University, Sweden, proposed an efficient design of electric motors to receive a cheque for Rs. 75,000. The third place was secured by Mr.Mayank Gupta from ITC, for his board game innovation, 5 Shells. He was honoured with a cash prize of Rs. 40,000. Most of the Ventura’09 finalists are in the process of setting up their own ventures with incubation support from some of the premier incubators in the country.

This year, VENTURA has attracted more than 500 business plans from all over the world, of which 10 have been chosen as the finalists, three being from the following international institutions: Politecnico Di Milano from Italy, University of Cambridge (UK), University of Cornell (USA). Some of the innovative ideas and plans competing at the finals are Super Turbine Technologies- Novel invention in superconducting materials, Spandan– Acoustic Material from plastic industry waste, Vyamanik– Out of Home (OOH) advert. using radio controlled blips and tethered aerostats,Panache– Web 2.0 venture on personalised fashion retail, BDpro – innovative low cost technology to produce biodiesel from cotton,among others.

Also,Ventura’10 is featuring beefed up cash prizes and incubation support up to INR 1 Crore courtesy the Departments of Science and Technology, Govt. of India and TREC-STEP who are the main sponsors of

the event. The judging panel for the final event include Mr. RMP Jawahar - Executive Director TREC-STEP, Dr. Dinesh Awasthi – Director EDI Ahmedabad, Mr. Deepam Mishra , CEO of i2india and Mr. Sanjukt Saha- Founder of One Billion Minds, among others.

The event is associated with premier incubators from India and abroad.There will be Cognizance awards as well for the socially and environmentally relevant entries, and special recognition forTechnical innovations.

For further details,please check www.ecell-nitt.org/ventura. All queries are entertained at [email protected].