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Rules

Entry Eligibility Guidelines

The organizers of the Business Plan Competition (BPC) have compiled the following set of eligibility rules to ensure compliance to the mission of the competition. All participating teams are expected to satisfy these rules. However, the organizers of the BPC recognize that no set of rules can apply to every circumstance and therefore reserve the right to determine eligibility or to disqualify any team that it determines to be in violation of the mission of the competition.

Composition of the UTK Student Team – The BPC is a competition for students of the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. To compete in the BPC students may form teams of up to five undergraduates. Students from other institutions may be members of the venture’s management team, but the UTK student team competing/presenting in the BPC must be made up only of UT students . The following clarifying restrictions apply:

  1. Prior BPC Activity: UTK student teams who have competed and finished in the top three in a previous year’s competition at UTK may not compete with the same plan in a subsequent year’s competition.
  2. Online Courses: Students who have enrolled in “online” courses may count only those online hours that relate directly to fulfilling graduation requirements for their degree. Enrollment in courses that are not directly related to the final degree will not be counted toward the minimum enrollment requirements. Students who plan to enter the competition and who are enrolled in online courses prior to the final registration date may submit a petition for admission to the competition to the organizers of the BPC (send petitions to cei@utk.edu). The petition should include the following: Degree that you are seeking, your major, your current status (year in school – junior, senior), the name and number of the online course, and the degree requirement that the course will fulfill and your progress in the course. Students who enroll in an online course only to qualify for the competition will not be given approval to submit a plan. All petition requests must be submitted no later than one week prior to the BPC plan submission date – no exceptions.
  3. Other UTK Campuses: The BCP is restricted to full-time undergraduate students attending the UTK campus.

Ownership of the Venture – In the event the plan submitted is for a venture actually underway, the following rules apply. UT student teams submitting a plan must have played a significant role in the creation of the venture and hold a significant stake in the venture. To avoid ventures formed and managed by non-students who have given token equity to students for writing their business plan, submissions should conform to the following criteria:

  1. Venture Creation: The UT student team must have played a major role in creating the venture. Someone other than the UT student team may own the idea for the plan, but the business plan must be the original work of the submitting UT student team or individual.
  2. Management Role: The UT student team must hold key management roles in the venture. In general, a member of the UT student team should be CEO, COO, or President of the venture or members of the UT student team should occupy 50% or more of the management positions that report directly to the CEO, COO, or President.
  3. Equity Ownership: The UT student team must own significant equity in the venture. In general, the UT student team should have an equity position of 50% or more of the total equity allocated to the management team and key advisors and 20% or more of the total equity of the venture.

Student plans that do not meet these criteria will be suspect and will be required to submit a petition to the organizers of the BPC showing evidence that they were a major contributor to the creation of the venture (send petitions to cei@utk.edu).

Judges

Judging of entries will be performed by a panel of independent judges, consisting of professionals involved in entrepreneurship. Judges may be successful entrepreneurs, venture capitalists, angel investors, or professional service providers working with the venture community. Any entry is subject to minimum criteria in terms of market potential, viability, and other factors, as determined by the judging panel's experience. If no entries meet the minimum criteria, prizes might not be awarded. Throughout any and all phases of the Business Plan Competition, all decisions of the judges are final.

Nature and Status of Venture – The competition is for new, independent ventures in concept, seed, start-up, or early growth stage. The following restrictions apply:

  1. Booked Revenues: Existing companies that have booked revenue prior to January 2009 are not eligible to enter.
  2. Professional Investment: Any existing company or idea that has received angel or venture capital financing prior to the competition is ineligible for this competition. Funding from personal sources including "family and friends" is allowed for competition applicants.

Venture Type Exclusions: The following ventures are generally excluded from the competition: buy-outs, expansions of existing companies, real estate syndications, tax shelters, franchises, licensing agreements for distribution in a different geographical area, and spin-outs from existing corporations.