Students win venture contest

Five graduate students from the School of Business won the central regional title at the Venture Capital Investment Competition Feb. 23.

The students will compete in April for the national title at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Sponsored by the Weinert Center for Entrepreneurship, the team bested teams from Northwestern University, University of Chicago, Indiana University, Purdue University, University of Maryland, University of Notre Dame and Washington University in St. Louis.

The team members include Sal Braico, Dylan Kaul, Jeff Prochnow, Craig Sterling and Jaume Villanueva. The team was advised by professors Ted Baker and Gerry George.

The students are members of the prestigious Weinert Applied Ventures in Entrepreneurship Program, a yearlong curriculum that prepares students to start, grow, and advise entrepreneurial businesses. Through the WAVE program, students also work very closely with local area businesses and UW–Madison startups to create strategic, operating and financing plans.

The Venture Capital Investment Competition is the nation’s premiere competition for MBA students interesting in venture investing. This is the third consecutive year that UW–Madison has placed in the regional competition.

The competition brings real startup companies and venture capitalists together with venture capital-minded MBA students to simulate in a competitive environment the process venture capital firms go through as they make investment decisions. This event is sponsored by the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill’s Center for Entrepreneurship and Technology Venturing.