Macleay College’s Entrepreneurship Forum was the perfect platform for three groups of students to pitch their big ideas to industry professionals and win some cash. The 2014 Entrepreneurship Forum saw successful business people give their tips and advice to budding student entrepreneurs.
Three groups of business students were selected – on a basis of their entrepreneurial merit – to pitch their bright ideas to a panel of industry professionals and further their business dreams.
The prizes originally on offer ranged from $150 for third place to $600 for the main prize. But to the students’ surprise guest speaker Glen Carlson doubled the prize money for the winning students.
U CHARG, headed up by Alex Lee, Aimee Broderick and Nick Chrisafis, took home the top dollar prize of $1200 by providing the forum with the best pitch of the day. These young entrepreneurs have developed, marketed and branded their product, outperforming the others with their engaging well thought-out business plan.
U CHARG is a compact, affordable and portable smart phone-charging device. It is tiny, neatly packaged and, apparently, “You don’t have to wait for delivery,” co-founder Nick Chrisafis told The Newsroom.
Winning team U CHARG Aimee Broderick, Alex Lee and Nick Chrisafis
“We will be using the prize money to invest in more of the product because they are in high demand.”
The runners up greatly differed in business direction and product.
First runner up saw CULTcha take home $600 in cash prizes. Created by Claire Bornhoffen, Savan Kovacevic and Cassandra Toscano, CULTcha organises pop up events around Sydney that deliver quality films, plus a Q&A with the films’ directors at the end – along with some red wine, popcorn and a little charity thrown in for good measure.
Coming in second and taking home $300 was Jersey4Jersey (J4J). The newest of the 3 businesses is an Australian company seeking to distribute sporting jerseys to well-established sporting teams such as Sydney FC. Through the sale of these jerseys, the company in turn sends equivalent jerseys to disadvantaged communities like Papua New Guinea. J4J was delivered by Pete Nowakowski and his team Jordan Peat and Lisa Maurice.
Glen Carlson, director of the popular 40-week business growth accelerator Key Person Of Influence, told The Newsroom he upped the original prize money because “It takes guts to get up on stage and give it a go … and the work involved. We also make a lot of money out of people with great pitches.” – Bree Hetherington
Top photo by Rebecca Hopper
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