A group of MBA students from Queensland’s QUT has secured third place in one of the world’s toughest business case competitions, the mai Bangkok Business Challenge.
The yearly competition aims to instil entrepreneurial spirit, foster strong networks, match startups with potential partners and investors and bring sustainability concerns to the forefront of commercial ventures.
QUT team finished behind the University of Oregon and the hosts, Sasin Graduate Institute of Business Administration.
The QUT Graduate School of Business team of Fraser Miller, Brad Newton, Paul Andrews and Samir Is-Hak staged a dramatic comeback after a first round loss to make the finals and score a place in the top three.
READ MORE: QUT GOES BACK TO BACK IN TOP CASE COMPETITION
- Team coach Dr Peter Beven said the team performed brilliantly.
“The competition pits teams from all over the world against each and the opportunity to go head to head with the likes Oregon, Cornell and Rice universities, from the US, and ESSEC Business School from France is a great opportunity,” he said.
“Having won the competition twice in the last three years put enormous pressure on the team but they stood up well after the early setback and really came home strongly in the final.”
Sponsored by the Thailand Stock Exchange and Houston Technology Centre in the US, the competition included 48 teams from 17 countries.
The Bangkok Business Challenge is a global new venture plan competition conducted in English, and was created in 2002 to encourage post-graduate students in business administration programs across Thailand and Asia to become more entrepreneurial.
Teams from business administration programs compete for the cash prizes and are judged by a panel of leading entrepreneurs, professionals and investors. Judges look for the most attractive new venture based on submitted written business plans, live presentations and venture exhibits.
Starting in 2007, the competition was co-hosted by the Market for Alternative Investment (mai), Thailand’s stock exchange for medium-sized public companies, and the Sasin Graduate Institute of Business Administration of Chulalongkorn University, setting a new precedent in the standard of regional business plan competitions.
Since 2008, the competition has welcomed participation from all nations across the globe. In 2013, The University of Texas in Austin, the organiser of the original post-graduate intercollegiate business plan competition, Moot Corp (now called Venture Labs Investment Competition), became a partner with the winner gaining an automatic entry to compete for the World Championship at the Global Venture Labs Investment Competition at The University of Texas in Austin.
In 2015, in partnership with the Houston Technology Center Asia, the competition introduced the Innovation Award to recognise ventures that make best use of their disruptive innovation to propel their commercialisation efforts.
