Congratulations 2009 Donald W. Reynolds Governor’s Cup Finalists

Presentations will be held April 22, 2009 at the Atlantis in Reno.  Final business plans are due at www.GovCupNevada.com on April 13, 2009.

Governor’s Cup Undergraduate Finalists* (Alphabetical Order)

Carbon Gold – UNR

Las Vegas Vertical Farms – UNLV

MJ’s Pizzeria – TMCC

Muse Interactive – UNR

Social Branch – UNLV

SolAir Solar-Thermal Air conditioning/heating – UNR

Governor’s Cup Graduate Finalists* (Alphabetical Order)

Dine Around Town – UNR

Energy Expansion & Design – UNR

Northern Nevada Nanotubes – UNR

Slopes – UNLV

Solar Cents: Non-tracking Solar Collector – UNR

UACD – University of Southern Nevada

Lt. Governor’s Award Undergraduate Finalists* (Alphabetical Order)

Carbon Gold – UNR

SolAir Solar-Thermal Air conditioning/heating – UNR

Sustainable Energy Solutions – UNR

Lt. Governor’s Award Graduate Finalists* (Alphabetical Order)

Appliance2.0 Solutions – UNR

Energy Expansion & Design – UNR

Solar Cents: Non-tracking Solar Collector – UNR

Team members, faculty advisors, and business descriptions here
Please contact Emily Somerville if you have any questions (702)  944-9722 or (775) 853) 4226

College and university students in Nevada submitted a record 56 business plans for the 5th Annual Donald W. Reynolds Governor’s Cup Collegiate Business Plan Competition, Nevada’s Center for Entrepreneurship and Technology said last week.

In the competition, teams of students compete for nearly $110,000 in cash awards. Winners will be announced April 23.

NCET said 174 students — 98 undergraduates, 76 graduate students — are members of teams that submitted business plans. The teams include 32 undergraduate groups and 76 groups of graduate students.

Participating students have majors in business, engineering, speech pathology, electrical engineering, journalism and biotechnology.

NCET also has seen an increase in business plans for the Lt. Governor’s Award, with 20 plans in contention for the business idea that best employs clean, renewable or efficient energy technologies and services. Sixteen teams also entered their plans in the NCED Commissioners’ Award competition, which recognizes the business plan that best addresses the economic development needs of rural Nevada.

NCET is seeking sponsors to donate or to purchase tables to attend the awards ceremony.

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Awards Dinner
Thursday, April 23 – Peppermill Hotel, Reno 

Please join us as we recognize Nevada’s best and brightest college and university students.

“The Governor’s Cup is the best capstone course for a business degree. I used skills from almost every one of my undergraduate classes.”

Robert Anderson – Efficient Processes

Cocktails – 5:30 pm
Dinner and Awards – 6:30 pm
Dessert Reception – 8:30 pm

Individual Tickets – $100
Tables of Eight – $750 

Or to Emily Somerville at Emily@NCET.org or (775) 853-4226 / (702) 944-9722

Please consider donating to the
Donald W. Reynolds Governor’s Cup Fund
Details here

For sponsorship information, please contact Dave Archer at (775) 315-7635

“This was the most time consuming course in my college career, but the most valuable. It taught me a lot about the process of developing a company and following through with an idea. The work environment was the best simulation of a small company. I now work in a small start up and am much better prepared for what I now face.”

Annie Vranizan – PDT

We’re expecting a record number of entries for this year’s Donald W. Reynolds Governor’s Cup Collegiate Business Competition and we need a large number of Preliminary Judges to review the written business plans.

Each judge will review two or three written business plans.  The plans will be available online on March 18, 2008 and the judging sheets are due back on March 27.  Each plan takes about two hours to evaluate and judges are asked to provide about two pages of feedback to the students.

We also need a few "standby" judges who will be available during the week of March 23 in case any of the other Preliminary Judges aren’t able to complete their assigned plans.

If you’re interested, please contact Emily Somerville at Emily@NCET.org or (775) 337-3328 / (702) 944-9722. 

The public is welcome to attend the TMCC Business Plan Competition’s Oral Presentations and Awards Ceremony on Feb. 13 from 8 am until 4 pm at TMCC’s Dandini Campus, RDMT 253 and 256 and Student Center

Truckee Meadows Community College and TMCC High School encourage the development of curricula and programs in the fields of innovation and entrepreneurship.

To encourage students from different academic disciplines to work together to develop new business ideas and good business plans for those ideas, and to promote greater participation and performance in the upcoming statewide Donald W. Reynolds Governor’s Cup Business Plan Competition held each spring, TMCC and TMCC High School have established the Business Plan Competition for students of Truckee Meadows Community College, Truckee Meadows High School and the University of Nevada, Reno. Participating institutions will be expanded in future years. This year the Donald W. Reynolds Governor’s Cup finalists will also have the opportunity to compete in a Tri-State (Nevada, Arkansas, Oklahoma) competition following the Governor’s Cup.

The TMCC Business Plan Competition seeks to teach students at all high school, college and university levels the importance of developing high quality business ideas and business plans and to provide them with the resources, not only to write comprehensive, complete and concise business strategies, but to also see those plans come to fruition. Participants of TMCC Business Plan Competition are strongly encouraged to participate in the spring Donald W. Reynold’s Governor’s Cup Business Plan Competition and the subsequent Tri-State Competition to compete for a share of the more than $200,000 in cash prizes offered.

On Friday, Feb 13, a panel of judges will evaluate the finalist teams based upon their revised written business plan submission and their oral presentation. This panel selects the first, second and third place teams.

Nevada’s Center for Entrepreneurship and Technology (NCET) has announced that the Intent to Compete deadline for the 2009 Donald W. Reynolds Governor’s Cup is February 16, 2009. The Donald W. Reynolds Governor’s Cup is the only state-wide collegiate business plan competition which encourages students from Nevada’s universities and colleges to consider entrepreneurship as a career option, and gives students real-world experience in developing business plans. During the competition, students receive feedback and guidance from Nevada’s business community as they compete for cash prizes totaling nearly a quarter of a million dollars.

Students that are interested in entering a business plan must first submit an Intent to Compete form at http://www.ncetgovcup.org/intent_to_compete_form.php.

This year’s awards ceremony will take place at the Peppermill Reno on April 23 where three winning graduate teams and three winning undergraduate teams will be awarded the $20,000 first prizes, $10,000 second prizes and $5,000 third prizes.

Finalists from Nevada will then go on to compete nationally in the Reynolds Cup Tri-State tournament. Nevada’s first and second place Governor’s Cup prize winners will compete against the first and second place winners from Arkansas and Oklahoma for an additional cash prize pool of $90,000. The Reynolds Cup oral presentations and awards ceremony will be held on Wednesday, May 27 at the Red Rock Resort in Las Vegas.

Ty Jones, finalist of 2006 and UNR graduate said that “The (Donald W. Reynolds Governor’s Cup) competition laid the groundwork for understanding how a business should be built from the ground up.  A lot of entrepreneurs don’t lay out their plans and don’t do adequate market research which accounts for a lot of failed businesses (even if they have great ideas).  But doing your research and laying out an explicit plan can help you refine your plan into something that can certainly be successful.  After this competition, I feel confident that I could start a successful business.”

According to Michael Chestone, winner of the 2006 undergraduate competition and Sierra Nevada College graduate, “Since the winning day, I have been amazed at how much easier introductions to high level people have been. More doors than I can count have been opened for our project and me personally. We have since utilized the funds and the people that we met to grow our business to a place it never would be without this experience)”.

In addition to the top three cash prize winners, the Governor’s Cup has grown to incorporate several additional awards. The Lt. Governor’s Award will be awarded again this year to the business plan that best employs clean, renewable or efficient energy technologies and services. The NCED Commissioners’ Award, created by the Nevada Commission on Economic Development (NCED), recognizes the business plan that best addresses the needs of rural Nevada.

“We have been so encouraged with the growth of the competition and the competitive entrepreneurial spirit that it has been able to foster since its inception,” said Emily Somerville of NCET. “It has been an exciting experience to watch these future entrepreneurs and business leaders become so involved and dedicated in the competition.”

College students can win a share of $200,000 in prize money for statewide business plan competition

College students from around the state are being invited to step up to the plate and vie for the nearly quarter million dollars worth of cash prizes that are up for grabs in the 5^th annual Donald W. Reynolds Governor’s Cup Business Plan Competition. As an added incentive, for the second year, winners of Nevada’s Governor’s Cup will have the chance to compete with the winners of Arkansas and Oklahoma’s Governor’s Cup in the Tri-State Reynolds Cup competition.  The  combined cash prize pool for the two competitions total is nearly $200,000, and a winning business plan from a Nevada team could potentially take home a total of $53,500 in cash prizes.  Last year, for example, UNLV team WATTs (Waste-Alternative Transformation Technologies, LLC) won a total of $38,500.
 

Students must commit to the competition by February 16, 2009 and turn in completed business plans by March 16, 2009.  While the Governor’s Cup enjoys significant ongoing funding from the Las Vegas-based Donald W. Reynolds Foundation, Nevada’s Center for Entrepreneurship and Technology (NCET) is currently seeking local sponsors within the business community to ensure the continued success of this competition.

Students participating in the Governor’s Cup competition will first submit their business plans and have them judged in March.  Finalists will then present their business plans in Reno during the week of April 20, 2009 with an awards dinner following in Reno at the Peppermill on April 23.
 

First and second place undergraduate and graduate Governor’s Cup winners will then travel to the Red Rock Casino Hotel in Las Vegas on May 26-28, 2008 to compete for the Tri-State Reynolds Cup.  They will be competing against the Governor’s Cup winners from Arkansas and

The Governor’s Cup is open to all Nevada college and university students. Students can compete alone or with a team of up to six people.  Students from all academic disciplines are invited to enter, and interdisciplinary teams are encouraged.  Undergraduate and graduate students have separate competitions and prizes.  Last year 48 teams, representing virtually every Nevada college and university, entered the competition.

“Nevada’s economy is built on small businesses, and the Governor’s Cup helps encourage our college and university students to consider entrepreneurship,” said Governor Jim Gibbons. “We are proud to host the second Tri-State Reynolds Cup competition in Las Vegas, and I know that our Nevada students will give their best and make a strong showing.  We hope that the winners will go on to start Nevada-based businesses that will help grow our local economy.”

After twelve of the top collegiate teams from Arkansas, Nevada and Oklahoma vied for honors of best undergraduate and graduate business plans, the winners were announced to more than 150 attendees at the Awards Gala at the Red Rock Resort in Las Vegas on May 15 where the Donald W. Reynolds Foundation awarded $90,000 in prize money during the inaugural Tri-State Donald W. Reynolds Cup. The Tri-State Competition is co-produced by NCET, Nevada’s Center for Entrepreneurship and Technology.

UNLV’s WATTs team took second place — and the $15,000 cash prize — in the undergraduate competition, after being named Nevada’s first place undergraduate team AND winning the NCED Commissioners’ Award for the business plan that best addressed the economic development needs of rural Nevada. WATT’s team members are Keeton Little, Josh Beilin and Kyle George and their Faculty Advisor is Janet Runge.

Waste-Alternative Transformation Technologies, LLC (WATTs) was developed to provide a holistic approach to the waste management and energy issues facing modern urban communities. By utilizing a multi-faceted approach that maximizes usable products extracted from municipal, commercial and industrial waste, WATTs will reduce the ecological burden on traditional landfills while producing clean, sustainable energy and energy products that do not rely upon fossil fuel sources.

The first place undergraduate prize and $25,000 was awarded to Nantiox from the University of Oklahoma.

In the graduate competition, first place and the $25,000 cash prize when to MerchantEyes from the University of Arkansas Fayetteville. Second place went to Perpetual Pharmaceuticals from University of Oklahoma.

“These talented students and dedicated faculty embody the great entrepreneurial spirit for which (state) has long been admired,” said Dave Archer, NCET’s CEO. “I thank them for their dedication in this endeavor; this is a true testament to the bright future of our state and its business leaders.”

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View the complete list of winners here

This time last year UNLV students Josh Beilin, Kyle George and Keeton Little weren’t very sure about their post-gradation plans. That changed Friday when they were handed a check for $20,000.

The three seniors took first place Friday in the NCET Nevada’s Donald W. Reynolds Governor’s Cup competition – an annual contest designed to foster entrepreneurship and give students some serious cash to help jump-start their innovative business plans. Known as Waste Alternatives Transformation Technologies, their team was the sole UNLV undergraduate participant. Read full story:

Technorati Tags: UNLV, Josh Beilin, Kyle George, Keeton Little, Donald W. Reynolds Governor’s Cup, Waste Alternatives Transformation Technologies, Nevada Commission on Economic Development Commissioner’s Award, Sierra Pacific Power Co., NCET, Nevada’s Center for Entrepreneurship and Technology

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