Business Plan Competition Identifies Future Entrepreneurs

From left: Prof. Hugh Thomas of the Department of Finance, Ms. Josephine Price, and the winning team

Six teams of graduate students from the University competed against each other in the 2004 New Venture Business Plan Competition, held by the Faculty of Business Administration, on 17th January at the MBA Town Centre of the University. The teams, shortlisted from the original nine, were each given 15 minutes to present their plans to a panel of judges comprising professional investors in new ventures who then examined the plans more closely in a 20-minute Q&A session.

The winning plan was a 'MIDS Mouse Terminator IV', a plan for replacing the standard computer mouse with a wireless, motion sensing ring. The winning team received HK$5,000 in prize money and will represent the University at the Moot Corp Competition to be held at the McCombs School of Business, University of Texas at Austin from 5th to 8th May 2004. The team members were Alan Lam (Ph.D. candidate in engineering), Vincent Wang Dong (full-time MBA student), Sharon Yan Ping (M.Phil. student in computer engineering), and Rockson Zhang (full-time MBA student).

In second place were part-time MBA candidate Alan To and M.Sc. (information technology) student Danny Pong with their plan Traceasy, a cheap portable tracing device that can be worn by children, seniors, and pets, and attached to expensive items such as cars to prevent them from being stolen. The duo walked away with HK$3,000 and the opportunity to represent the University at the Asian Moot Corp Competition, to be held in Hawaii from 16th to 18th March 2004.

The judges were Mr. Vincent Chan, head of North Asia, JAFCO Investment (HK) Ltd., Mr. S.W. Cheung, vice-president (business development and technology support, Hong Kong Science and Technology Parks Corporation, Mr. Alan Ho, senior manager (technopreneurial funding), Innovation and Technology Commission, and Ms. Josephine Price, managing director, CLSA Private Equity Ltd.