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APRIL
2006 |
Student NewsSDSU Teams Wins Venture Challenge
An SDSU student team won the $15,000 first prize in the 17th Annual Venture Challenge this March. Additionally, the MBA student team won the $1,000 Golden Phone Award and the $500 prize as runner-up for the Social Innovation Award. This is the third time in the history of Venture Challenge that SDSU’s team has won and the first time since 1999. SDSU’s team, Envirobinz, is an advertising company that aims to help communities and cities divert waste from landfills by providing aesthetic recycling receptacles installed at high pedestrian traffic locations. Team coach Harvey Goodfriend thinks these students have the entrepreneurial spirit to lead them to real world success. “I’ve been coaching teams for seven years now and this is the most outstanding one. ‘Envirobinz’ is not a concept; they already have several important acquisitions. In fact, they already have several other businesses underway.” Currently, the team has a contract with National City, where their receptacles have helped increase recycling in the city by 30 percent, and the company is in negotiations with the city of San Diego. For more information on Envirobinz, please visit www.envirobinz.com. The team will participate in additional business plan competitions, including the Global Moot Corp 2006 Competition, the first and largest such event in the country, hosted by the University of Texas at Austin May 3-6. “Winning is a great thing,” said Prabakar Mahalingam, President and CEO of Envirobinz and a student in SDSU’s MBA program. “However, the bigger prize in the competition is finding investors, as well as receiving feedback from judges.” This year’s Venture Challenge, organized by SDSU’s Entrepreneurial Management Center, took place March 23-24 in Mission Valley. 20 teams competed in this year’s event, including students from University of California, San Diego’s Rady School of Management, who placed second in their first attempt at the competition. “SDSU’s Entrepreneurial Management Center has been the biggest asset in my MBA career,” Mahalingam said. “Their staff has been very supportive in helping us in our business plan and providing valuable feedback. Without them, we wouldn’t be able to do this.” Student Selected to Represent SDSU at Research CompetitionGraduate business student Roy Segovia has been selected as one of 10 students to represent SDSU at the Student Research Competition at California State University Channel Islands. He will present his research project, “Improving Trust in Government with Paralingual Web-sites” at the conference in May. SDSU Grad Students Win Honda Research Program Competition
Four SDSU graduate business students, from Marketing Professor Don Sciglimpaglia’s Seminar in Marketing Research course, were recently awarded first prize in a Honda Research Program competition. Students Nannette Bell, Toby Seiler, Claudia Gramm and Christina Schranz, reported the results of their research to executives at Honda and RPA, Honda’s ad agency, at Honda headquarters in Torrance, California on January 27. The SDSU team was awarded the $1,000 first prize among graduate business schools. Cal Poly San Luis Obispo had the winning entry among undergraduate schools. This year’s competition is part of a Honda Research Program, geared toward researching Gen Y awareness and car buying motivations. A leading marketing education consulting company, EdVenture Partners, partnered with Honda to sponsor the competition. “This is the second peer-to-peer assignment we’ve undertaken with EdVenture Partners, and a third is underway,” said Executive V.P., General Manager of RPA Denny Remsing. “San Diego State placed first among graduate schools that competed in the Honda Research Program. They were very professional in the way they undertook the assignment, which gave us new and fresh insights into the Gen Y consumer. We also really liked the energy and enthusiasm they displayed in presenting their findings.” During the fall 2005 semester, students were asked to implement research methodologies such as interviews, focus groups, and surveys to collect data and analyze, report, and present their findings to the client. The group’s task was to research members of the youth car buying market segment and current owners of Gen Y-inspired vehicles. Sciglimpaglia said, “This was a truly outstanding and creative research effort. The team conducted focus groups, attended events, did an extensive blog search and conducted an online survey of nearly 550 target consumers.” “The experience of working with a leading marketing agency and Fortune 500 company has been an invaluable part of my MBA education at SDSU. Presenting our research to marketing professionals from Honda and RPA was a thrilling experience,” said student Nannette Bell who was on SDSU’s winning team. American Honda Motor Co. Senior Manager of National Advertising Tom Peyton said, “The insights gained by the SDSU team proved to us (Honda) that there’s still no substitution for ‘going to the spot’ to understand forces driving the marketplace. They brought insights that were fresh and relevant...something not always found in the reams of data we are often confronted with.” Two years ago, graduate students from Sciglimpaglia’s course won first place at the national level for another Case Study Competition, also sponsored by EdVenture Partners, and presented their ideas on how to market to the Millennial Generation. “EdVenture Partners has had the opportunity to work with students and faculty at San Diego State for 15 years on a variety of industry-education partnership programs,” said EdVenture Partners CEO Tony Sgro. “The effort put forth by SDSU students has consistently impressed our clients, including this research campaign and SDSU students always find themselves on the winner’s podium.” New Group of Students Works on Marketing PlanDuring the current spring semester, a new group of students are participating in a nationwide competition and implement their own creative marketing campaign, geared toward the launch of Honda’s new vehicle, the Fit. The students are hosting an event to unveiled the new car at “It All Fits” on April 27th from 8:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. near the free speech steps in front of the Aztec Center. The program provided each school with $2,500 to develop, execute and analyze a campaign to introduce Honda’s all-new premium subcompact car to a key target market – fellow college peers. The outdoor car display will include free food and refreshments, cash prizes and surprise giveaways. Sports Business MBA Program Hosts First Case Competition with Padres
On March 18th and 20th, the inaugural Sports MBA Case Competition was held at PETCO Park. Hosted by the Padres, the event focused on the upcoming World Baseball Classic (WBC) and featured seven teams of four MBA students from SDSU, USC and UCLA. Students were tasked with examining a case study developed by the Padres that outlined the numerous challenges faced by executives as they prepared to host the final rounds of the WBC, an international sporting event. Teams were given 24 hours to work on a case study examining the myriad issues facing MLB executives in charge of planning the inaugural WBC and then present their business solutions to a panel of judges. The team from the Anderson School of Management at UCLA won this first Case Competition.
The victory not only netted these four students tickets to the semifinals and finals of the World Baseball Classic, but also earned the team possession of the SDSU Sports MBA Case Competition surfboard trophy, which the team has been invited to defend at next year’s event. The second annual SDSU Sports MBA Case Competition is slated for November, 2006. For more information about participating in the upcoming case competition or to inquire about the SDSU Sports Business Management program, students may contact the SDSU Sports MBA office by phone at (619) 594-6010 or via email at sportsmba@sdsu.edu. SIFE Team Places First Runner-Up
The CBA’s Students in Free Enterprise (SIFE) team represented SDSU in a regional competition in San Francisco on March 31, placing first runner-up in their division. They placed first in two special competitions in the region, Aflac SIFE USA Market Economics Competition and SAM’S CLUB SIFE USA Entrepreneurship Competition, winning $500 for each. The team was assessed on how effectively they measured and demonstrated that they created economic opportunity by helping others learn how to succeed as an entrepreneur and/or improve an existing business. The students on the winning team, Jamie Rae, Mark Murton, Doug Uyeda, Rosa Saboni, Greg Bodene, Erika Diaz and Corey Travis, were all in BA 404, Small Business Consulting, both this semester and Fall 2005. Professor of Marketing Don Sciglimpaglia, and Professor of Accountancy, Howard Toole, served as advisors.
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