The goal for the Rensselaer Business Model Competition is not only to provide teams with prizes of cash and in-kind services, but also to provide student entrepreneurs with the opportunity to improve their business through workshops, customer interviews, coaching, feedback, and live practice sessions in preparation for the myriad of competition opportunities held annually each spring across the nation and globally. This competition has been reformatted to accommodate online live team pitches.

View photos of past competitions. 

Qualification Criteria

1. This competition is open to graduate and undergraduate students only.
2. Each team must be made of at least half RPI students.
3. The business idea must be a student-born idea.
4. Students must be enrolled for the academic year in which the competition takes place.
5. Students may not participate in more than 1 team each year of the competition.
6. RPI students must play an integral role in each team.
7. The presentation must be delivered by RPI student(s).
8. If the competition is split into graduate and undergraduate tracks, teams must enter in the division dictated by the highest education level of all the team members. This decision will be made after all submissions are received.

Competition Process

• Plans can be for a product, service, process or technique.
• The submission must be unique to the market.
• Your submission does not have to be technology-driven.

In any competition submission, you should describe your business idea without revealing any proprietary information. We don't want to know what your secret sauce is. Part of this process is learning how to write and present your idea in an intriguing manner without revealing your intellectual property.

Judging 

Judges will consist of community members and alumni with varying backgrounds in entrepreneurship and business. Judges will provide the teams with feedback for fine-tuning and clarifying their business model and presentation for future competitions. The judges' scores will determine the winners. Judging rubric 

Prizes

Over $15,000 in cash and in-kind services will be awarded to top competitors. If awarded a monetary prize, the money will be distributed in increments based on achieved milestones. All prizes must be claimed within 12 months of the date of the competition or will be forfeited.

Sponsors

• Vikash '98 and Vikram '02 Agrawal, Founders, eTransmedia; Vik Brothers Investment Fund; Levrx
  Born in India, Vikash and Vikram, better known as “the Viks,” immigrated in the mid-90s to pursue graduate studies at Rensselaer. Their first venture together, Etransmedia, was a highly successful digital health software company that was founded while they were students and attracted the interest of a major hospital network in 2016 which acquired them. After the sale, the two were ready to pursue new opportunities in the digital health industry. That is when Levrx was born. This company is tackling the skyrocketing prices of prescription drugs by driving efficiency and maximizing savings for consumers.
• Severino Center for Technological Entrepreneurship
  The Paul J. ’69 and Kathleen M. Severino Center for Technological Entrepreneurship helps foster new generations of budding and successful entrepreneurs through outreach programs, education, and support systems.
• Mauriel Kapouytian Woods LLP (MKW)
  MKW is a boutique technology law and commercial litigation firm serving clients from startups to Fortune 500 companies.