Three entrepreneurial students won $10,000 in prizes and business services at Pirates Pitch, the third annual Seton Hall University Venture Fund Competition. At the contest, held on April 24 in Jubilee Hall Auditorium, five student teams pitched ideas either to start a business, or to expand an existing student-run venture.
Carl Banks Jr., a senior studying graphic design in the College of Arts & Sciences, won the $6,000 first place award for Audiotecha, an idea for an online music database that will target avid music listeners between the ages of 14 and 45. Taseen, a senior studying Economics in the Stillman School of Business, won the $3,500 second place award for TapFactory, a venture he has already started. TapFactory creates and sells I-Phone apps through the Apple App Store; its signature app is the popular StickyNotes. Additionally, the $500 Audience Participation Award was snagged by the three member team of Stillman School students Martin Hendela and Muhammad Abdelhardy, and Muhammad’s brother Zaid Abdelhardy, a student in the College of Arts & Sciences. Their business idea, Eco-Book, is for an electronic dispenser of college text books designed to reduce student costs.
“Pirates Pitch is a wonderful way of showcasing entrepreneurship and innovation,” said Pravina Raghavan, Director, Innovation and Technology for the U.S. Business Administration and one of the contest’s judges. “It allows students to get their ideas launched in the real world while benefiting from the intense mentorship and support from Seton Hall.” The other judges were Bill Bartzak, founder, President and CEO of MD-OnLne, Jim DiCarlo, co-founder and Environmental Compliance Officer, Fleetwash, Inc.; Travis Kahn, Executive Director, TechLaunch, LLC, and Shannon Morris, President, Sigma Group. The judges evaluated the student ideas for business ventures based on several criteria, including originality, viability and growth potential.
“I was very impressed by the business plans presented by our Finalists teams,” said Joyce Strawser, dean of the Stillman School of Business. “The proposals balanced creativity and innovation with responsiveness to practical market needs. It was clear that the student teams had learned a great deal in their preparations for the Pitch event, and I am very grateful to the mentors and judges for the valuable input and feedback they provided. In all, Pirates Pitch continues to be an extraordinary educational experience that perfectly aligns with the Stillman School’s educational focus on transforming concepts into practice,” she added.
Susan Scherreik, Director of the Center Studies in the Stillman School of Business, which sponsors the competition, noted that the prize money available to contestants was double the awards of prior years, adding to the competition’s excitement. However, Scherreik stressed that the most important part of the awards is the guidance and business services the winners will receive from the successful entrepreneurs who sit on the Center for Entrepreneurial Studies Board of Advisors.
Pirates Pitch is open to all undergraduate and graduate students. Students from other universities can also compete in the contest, as long as one member of their team is a Seton Hall University students. Scherreik noted that students from many academic disciplines participated, including business, political science, communications, criminal justice and computer science.
The contest kicked off in January when students were required to submit proposals for ideas for business startups, or ideas to expand an existing business. A group of independent judges, comprised of successful entrepreneurs, selected the top ten student teams as semi-finalists. Next, these semi-finalists made brief “pitches” to independent judges, who, in turn, selected the five finalists. These finalist teams, which received mentoring from alumni entrepreneurs and other entrepreneurs, including the Center for Entrepreneurial Studies Board of Advisors, and counselors from the Newark and Morristown chapters of the non-profit SCORE organization, created detailed 10 to 15 page business plans of their ideas, which were submitted in early April. The judges based their decisions on a combination of the written business proposals and the oral presentations by the student teams.
“Winning this year’s contest meant a lot to me,” said first place winner Carl Banks. “I was very fortunate to have the support of the Stillman School of Business for allowing me this grand opportunity to help cultivate a concept and bring it one step closer to reality,” he added. Further Bank praised Pirates Pitch and other collegiate business idea contests for providing students with the motivation and confidence to persevere. Last November, Banks’ Audiotecha business idea was one of 32 semi-finalists selected nationwide in Student Startup Madness, the Collegiate Digital Media Entrepreneurship Tournament, sponsored by Syracuse University.
“Pirates Pitch was an amazing experience,” second-place winner Taseen Peterson said. “Not only did I get feedback and support from the mentors with industry experience, but I also had the opportunity to really think critically about myself and my business. “ But best of all, he added, “One of the judges even expressed interest in funding our startup!”
Scherreik noted that the prize money for the Pirates Pitch contest was raised through the funding-raising efforts over the past several years of the Center for Entrepreneurial Studies’ Board of Advisors. “We are grateful to the donors to the Center for Entrepreneurial Studies. Their generosity has allowed us to offer our students an enriching experience. In today rapidly changing business environment, students need to know not just how to apply for existing jobs, but how to create new ones. Pirates Pitch is a tool to help them to do so,” she said.
First photo, left to right
Joyce Strawser, Zaid Abdelhady, Martin Hendela, Muhammad Abdelhady, Carl Banks Jr. Jason Yin, (Chair of the Management Department) , Susan Scherreik
