Michael Jordan did it, Bill Gates accomplished it and now University of Nebraska-Lincoln students are trying their hand.
Some UNL students brought their future business plans to the eighth annual UNL Venture Plan Championship. The 8th Annual UNL Venture Plan
* First Place $1,000 David Graff, Brian Kaiser and John Wirtz, Agile Sports Technology * Second Place $300 Matt Anderson, Naturally Herbs * Third Place $100 Ashu Guru, ImagineSurvey * Honorable Mention Brian Jedlicka, Midwestcollegediscount.com Undergraduate Track * First Place $1000 Heather Bittinger, Great Plains Nursery * Second Place $300 Pete Sveen, Pete's Meticulous Detailing * Third Place $100 Jonathan Jacobs, NaturalScalping * Honorable Mention Lesley Harvey, Handy Bags |
Three graduate students presented their business plans and won the first place prize of $1,000. The winners also get a chance to compete in three other events in California, Oklahoma and Texas.
Each team was required to present a 15-minute presentation, and the judges asked the teams a series of questions about their business plans. The judges also critiqued the participants' work.
Brian Kaiser, a graduate student in business and one of the first-place winners, said he and his two partners are the starters of Agile Sports Technology.
"We were just trying to keep focused," he said. "We knew we had to be prepared to answer any questions."
Kaiser said the business he helped design with business graduate students David Graff and John Wirtz is one that creates software that can be shared between coaches and players.
Their goal was to create a way for coaches and players to review and learn from their past games, and the three started designing the business even before they decided to compete.
Heather Bittinger, a graduate student in horticulture, won a first-place prize of $1,000 in the Undergraduate Track for her Great Plains Nursery business.
"It was an awesome experience," she said.
Bittinger's business was designed to produce plants of the Plains. She said the Nebraska Statewide Arboretum Great Plants Program selected the plants.
Bittinger said she is going to compete in another entrepreneur competition in the future, and she enjoyed the feedback she received from the judges. Because they were business owners themselves, she said, the judges knew what they were talking about.
"They had real-life experience," she said. "They had just awesome input."
Since his team's win, Wirtz said he and his group have had the opportunity to meet with top executives of Microsoft and sports representatives about their ideas for Agile Sports Technology.
"Regardless of how the competitions go, we're in this for a while," Kaiser said.
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