A team of TCU MBAs recently won regionals in the invitation-only 2020 Venture Capital Investment Competition (VCIC), beating out Notre Dame, Indiana, Georgia Tech, Pittsburgh, and Brazil FGV to take first place. Now, the students are en route to the global finals to be held in March.
70 universities in total competed in regional competitions across the U.S., Canada, and India, with the first place winner of each advancing to the global competition.
The Cowtown Angels Fellows Program at TCU’s Neely Institute for Entrepreneurship and Innovation provided the team a solid background on the skills needed to excel in the VCIC competition.
“Many things came together to make this win possible. The Cowtown Angels Fellowship prepared us with a sophisticated knowledge of deal terms and an advanced framework to guide our due diligence efforts,” said team member Joe Dickerson in a Neely School of Business news post. “The entrepreneurial capital course gave us foundational knowledge. Coaching from TCU Neeley alum Les Kreis and mentoring from the investors at Cowtown Angels gave us a competitive advantage.”
The competition—dubbed the world’s largest in venture capital—has teams acting as analysts with $100 million in potential investment while taking stock of actual startups. Participants listened to pitches, did due diligence on the startups, and finally provided an investment strategy to 18 venture capitalist judges. Scoring was based on term sheets explaining the teams’ reasoning and partner meetings.
“Our familiarity with deal flow and company pitches as Cowtown Angels Fellows gave us more time to strategize as a team during the competition,” said team member Yang. “Our mentors—Les Kreis, Michael Sherrod and Rodney D’Souza—and team captain Joe Dickerson made sure we were all on the same page, and that unified position helped us think quickly on our feet.”
Along with Dickerson and Yang, the TCU MBA team included Cadell Alexander, Alejandro Velasquez, and Andrew Hicks. The team’s next step is the global finals to be held in Chapel Hill, North Carolina on March 27-28 where they will go up against the 12 other regional winners from the U.S., Europe, Canada, and India.
This article was updated on Friday, Feb. 14 at 11:30 a.m.
Get on the list.
Dallas Innovates, every day.
Sign up to keep your eye on what’s new and next in Dallas-Fort Worth, every day.
R E A D N E X T
-
Your Two Cents: The Dallas Mayor's Task Force on Innovation and Entrepreneurship Wants Your FeedbackWhat should the city be doing to attract, retain, and support startups? Share your recommendations and ideas. But hurry, the Startup Information Survey will close by the end of the week.
-
Global Entrepreneurship Week Fort Worth kicks off November 7-12 with an opening party, a pitch competition, a State of Entrepreneurship luncheon, and lots more for founders and entrepreneurs to sink their teeth into.
-
The TCU Neeley Institute for Entrepreneurship and Innovation received top honors at last week's Global Consortium of Entrepreneurship Centers (GCEC) Awards for best entrepreneurship programs—becoming the first university to receive a major GCEC award three years in a row.
-
Mayor Cites New Report at the Fort Worth State of Entrepreneurship: Startups Created Nearly 30K JobsMayor Mattie Parker, whose catchphrase is "Go Time," says she coined the term for a reason. Fort Worth is at a pinnacle of possibility, and entrepreneurship is at the center of that. The data speaks for itself, Parker said: A new jobs report from Sparkyard shows startups play a significant role in job creation in Fort Worth and Tarrant County—with average salaries more than twice the minimum wage.
-
Here's our rundown of each speaker, award, and Q&A from the Dallas Entrepreneur Center's annual State of Entrepreneurship.
