Skip to main content

Jenkins MBA Teams Win First, Second Place in NC State’s 2012 LuLu eGames’ New Venture Challenge

First and second place in the 2012 Lulu eGames’ New Venture Challenge category at NC State University went to two teams of entrepreneurship students in Poole College’s Jenkins MBA program. The competition results were announced during the LuLu eGames reception held Monday, April 30, 2012. The annual competition is managed by NC State’s Entrepreneurship Initiative.

The students’ business plans were completed as part of their Jenkins MBA High Technology Entrepreneurship and Commercialization (HiTEC) program which focuses on developing new business ventures based on emerging technologies.”

First place with a $5,000 prize went to 7ED, a company using NC State technology to manufacture an essential component used by most LED manufacturers. 7ED’s team members are Dragana Mendel, Michael Teal, Garret Foster, and Sunny Wang.

Second place with a $3,500 prize was awarded to Zeek, a company that displaces the paper coupon book with an online and mobile coupon system that takes fundraising into the 21st century. Zeek’s team members are Matthew Davis, Josh Robertson and Jonathan Stephens.

“We are proud of these HiTEC teams and pleased to see the students rewarded for all their hard work over the past academic year,” said Dr. Ira R. Weiss, dean of the Poole College of Management. “We view these awards as both recognition of the great work that goes on in research labs across NC State, which is producing the new technologies, and continuing validation for our process-based approach to teaching technology commercialization. I commend our faculty and the mentors who work with our students in these ventures. Their support is greatly appreciated.”

“It has been exciting to see the great work the HiTEC teams have been doing over the years,” said Dr. Steve Allen, associate dean for Poole College’s Jenkins Graduate Programs and Research. “It is especially exciting to see their business plans validated and placed on the path toward funding and the launch of new business ventures.”

Read more about these teams

7ED is an upcoming company capitalizing on the patent-pending Substrate Defect Reduction (SSDR) technology from NCSU. This technology allows the team’s company to manufacture (Al)GaN device template, an essential component used by most LED manufacturers. Their process provides a competitive advantage, as it allows the company to solve the three most prominent industry problems: high material defect density, bowing, and low light extraction. UV LED market segment was identified as its most attractive entry point and high-brightness LED market as expansion strategy. The company is expected to break even after three years and reach over $11M in revenue by year six.

Zeek has found one remaining paper industry not yet disrupted by the shift from print to digital: fundraiser coupon books. Zeek displaces the paper coupon book with an online & mobile phone book. Fundraiser groups sell 1-year renewable subscriptions to Zeek’s site instead of a paper book, providing a unique 21st century fundraising program. Zeek has launched and is operating in three markets – Greensboro, N.C., Wilmington, N.C. and Northern Virginia.

Read more about the LuLu eGames at NC State’s Entrepreneurship Initiative website.

The Jenkins MBA program’s HiTEC concentration is taught by Poole College faculty and coordinated through The Entrepreneurship Collaborative. In this two-semester curriculum, graduate students learn to assess the commercialization potential of new technologies, develop business plans, and then proceed to launch the new ventures, if the team desires to advance to that stage. The HiTEC process helped move more than a dozen concepts through business development and into the operational stage over the past ten years.

About Poole College’s Graduate Entrepreneurship Curriculum

The NC State Jenkins MBA program’s entrepreneurship and technology commercialization concentration is taught by Poole College faculty in the Department of Management, Innovation and Entrepreneurship and is coordinated through The Entrepreneurship Collaborative. In this year-long curriculum, graduate students learn to assess the commercialization potential of new technologies, develop business plans, and then proceed to launch the new ventures, if the student team desires to advance to that stage. This process, called the HiTEC process, has helped to move more than a dozen concepts through business development and into the operational stage over the past ten years.