UT Chattanooga teams competing in “SoCon Entrepreneurship Challenge” Friday and Saturday
A product of the Southern Conference’s Academic Exchange program, the event is a pitch competition designed to showcase students with an idea for an innovative business or nonprofit organization. The competition features two tracks — for-profit and nonprofit.
Student teams from the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga (UTC) will be in Macon, GA Friday and Saturday as part of the second annual “SoCon Entrepreneurship Challenge” at the Mercer Innovation Center’s Smisson Complex.
A product of the Southern Conference’s Academic Exchange program, the event is a pitch competition designed to showcase students with an idea for an innovative business or nonprofit organization. The competition features two tracks — for-profit and nonprofit. Each team, which was selected by its participating university, will feature one to four students competing in each track. The selection process for the teams is determined by each individual school. In addition to teams from Mercer and UTC, participants will be coming from The Citadel, Samford University, Virginia Military Institute, Western Carolina University and Wofford College.
The “SoCon Entrepreneurship Challenge,” held for the first time in 2022, will feature a semifinal pitch round with all 14 teams presenting their ideas on Friday. Top professionals from the for-profit and nonprofit industries will serve as judges and decide which teams move on to the final pitch competition round on Saturday. The teams will be scored on product/service, opportunity, target market, financial feasibility and presentation, and the winning team from each track will be awarded $6,000.
“We are thrilled to be hosting the SoCon Entrepreneurship Challenge at Mercer this year,” said Dr. Briana Stenard, Associate Professor of Management and Entrepreneurship. “At Mercer, we believe in encouraging entrepreneurship education and supporting student businesses, and this competition is right in line with that mission. We look forward to seeing our Mercer student teams present alongside the other entrepreneurial teams in the SoCon.”
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