January-February 2005

VCIC Team Chosen

The results are in from the second annual Haas Venture Capital Investment Competition (VCIC™), and the Haas School will be represented by Epoch Ventures.

Hosted at Haas by the Lester Center and the Haas Entrepreneurs Association, VCIC is a competition designed for student teams playing the role of hypothetical venture capital firms charged with evaluating investment opportunities and deciding where to place their money. Also participating are real entrepreneurs seeking funding (the investment opportunities) and a panel of real venture capitalists who act as judges. Teams read business plans, meet entrepreneurs, conduct an abbreviated due diligence and summarize all of their analysis in an investment strategy that they pitch to the panel of VC judges.

The winning team, Epoch Ventures, is composed of Manuel Rodriguez, Daniel Yoo, Camille Landis, Alex Jeffers and Josh Scott, all MBA class of 2005. Before they head to the e Western Regional VCIC Competition on Feb. 3-5 at the University of Colorado, Boulder, they will be coached by Steve Kishi, partner at Hummer Winblad Venture Partners, and Terry Opdendyk, general partner at Onset Ventures.

At Boulder the Haas team will compete against teams from USC, UCLA, Georgia Tech, University of Texas, Washinton University of St Louis, San Diego State University, and University of Washington. The top two teams at the Western Regionals will go to the Nationals held at the University of North Carolina, Kenan-Flager Business School. This year’s Nationals will be held on April 7-9.

The Lester Center and the student organizers wish to thank Gabriel Ventures, Partech International, Hummer Winblad Venture Partners, the Woodside Fund and Apax Ventures for their support of the competition.

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