Event Formats:

ROUND 1: ONLINE SUBMISSION OF EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
For the preliminary round, all participating teams will have to submit an Executive Summary of their business idea.

• The team should submit an executive summary of their business plan in a PDF or DOC or simple TEXT file as their entry for the first round.
• An Executive Summary is basically an abstract of your business idea. It should contain all the details pertaining to the plan that the participant feels necessary and appropriate. We provide the team freedom in tems of size of the summary.Generally a 2-3 page summary in the format given below is sufficient.
• The executive summary should have 1.5 line spacing, 12 point Times New Roman font and 1 inch margin on each side. Not following the format is a sufficient reason for disqualification.
• The registrations for the First Round will be open till 5th November 2009 .
• The completed executive summary should be uploaded during the time of registration. The file should be named as: VENTURA_(Team Name).PDF.
• NOTE: Data taken from published/unpublished sources must be adequately referenced.
• NOTE: Sample formats and templates are available for reference on the resources tab on our website.

ROUND 2: MENTORING SESSION

·         30 teams will be short listed from Round 1 based on their Executive Summaries and the results will be declared on 25th November, 2009.

·         The teams will then be assigned mentors for a mentoring period of 45 days to guide them in plugging the loop holes and fine tuning their B-plans. The mentors will be entrepreneurs, venture capitalists and/or consultants who have considerable experience with business plans.

·         NOTE: Team inputs will be taken for assigning mentors. However the actual assignment of mentors to the team is at the sole discretion of the Ventura organizing committee.

·         At the end of the mentoring session, the teams will be required to send in their detailed business plan toventura@ecell-nitt.org.The  team shall submit a copy of their Business plan on or before 2300hrs IST of 7th January 2010. Each entry should have a cover page mentioning the following details:

a) Team ID.

b) Name(s) of team member(s).

c) Contact information.

·         The name(s) of team member(s) or their institute should not appear anywhere else in the body of the B-Plan.

·         Based on the submitted business plan, a final list of 12 teams will be selected from the top 30 and the results will be declared on 15th January 2010.

·         The short listed teams would then have to confirm their participation on or before 20th January 2010 by registering for the finals at www.ecell-nitt.org/ventura/finals

ROUND 3: VENTURA FINALS

·         Third and final round of Ventura 10 is a combination of two presentations that the team needs to make during the Ventura 10 weekend to be held on the 30th and 31st of January 2010 to an elite panel of judges, in person, at the NIT, Trichy campus.

·         The first of these presentations will be an Elevator Pitch to be held on the 30th of January, 2010 in front of a panel of Angel Investors and Business Incubators.

·         The final detailed presentation of the business plan will be made on the 31st of January, 2010.

·         The presentations can be in .PPT/Flash or any other format that the team considers appropriate for the event. However the Ventura organizing committee will not be responsible for supplying the required software/packages to support the format.

·         A maximum of 3 members from the team may present their plan in front of the panel of judges for both the presentation rounds.

·         Presentations slots are allotted by drawing lots. The order will be established at the beginning of the day 1 of the finals and informed to the teams at the start of the contest.

·         The time duration for the final presentation will be 20+10 minutes (20 minutes for presentation and 10 minutes for Q&A session with the jury).

·         All teams must necessarily make both the presentations during the Ventura 10 weekend to be eligible for the final evaluation.

·         All teams will be allotted an additional 10 minutes of time to interact with the jury after all the final presentations are made on day 2 of the finals. This is done so that the teams are able to discuss points with the jury which they would not otherwise want to disclose in front of the audience.

·         If the team so desire they may also request for an additional 10 minutes for their product demonstration. This request has to be made while registering for the Ventura finals. The Ventura organizing committee may or may not provide this slot based on time constraints.

 

Formation of Team 
1. Eligibility: Participants can be 
• Students enrolled in any full time educational course.
• Persons employed in companies, including start-ups. 
• Entrepreneurs.

NOTE: The maximum age of any member of team should not be more than 27 years as on 1st Jan. 2010.

2. Team Composition: 
• A maximum of 6 members are allowed per team. However for the final presentation round, a maximum of 3 members will be allowed to present the plan in front of the judging panel.
• No person is allowed to be part or member of more than one team.
• No change in the team structure will be allowed after the team is registered except under certain exceptional circumstances and the organization committee reserves the sole right to grant any change in the team. 
• Each team shall self-appoint a leader, who shall be the single point of contact for the organizer. All communication will be directed to the team leader. The team is not permitted to change its leader after registration.

 

Timeline:

Round 1: Online Submission

• Registrations open: 25th September 2009.
• Last date for submission of an Executive Summary of the business plan (online submission): 2300 hrs on 5th November 2009.
• Declaration of teams selected for round 2: 20th November 2009.

Round 2: Mentoring session

• Mentoring session begins for the short listed teams: 25th November 2009.
• Mentoring session ends: 7th January 2010.
• Submission of the detailed business plan: 2300hrs 7th January 2010
• Results of the round 2 declared on 15th January 2010.

Round 3: Final Presentation 

• Last date for confirming participation in the final round: 2300 hrs on 20th January 2010.
• Final presentations of the B-plan to be held in the NIT, Trichy campus: Saturday, 30th January 2010 and Sunday 31st January 2010.
• The first of presentations will be an Elevator Pitch to be held on the 30th of January, 2010.
• The final detailed presentation of the business plan will be made on the 31st of January, 2010.

NOTE: The dates for round 3 are tentative

 

Prizes and Rewards

1. CASH AWARDS:
a) The top three finalists at Ventura 10 receive cash prizes as follows:

• 1st prize: 1, 35,000 INR
• 2nd prize: 80,000 INR
• 3rd prize: 50,000 INR

b) All the other finalists will get a consolation prize of 5000 INR per team.
c) There are also three cognizance awards as follows:
• The most Socially Relevant Plan - 20,000 INR 
• The most Technically Innovative Plan - 20,000 INR. 
• The most Environmentally Conscious Plan - 20,000 INR.

2. INCUBATION SUPPORT:

Ventura 10 has links with the premier incubators in India and abroad to provide the teams with the most comprehensive start up support possible. TREC-STEP is our primary incubation partner and offers access to The Govt. of India’s financial support to setup technology based startup enterprises. NSRCEL, IIM Bangalore and VILLGRO Resources, Chennai provide incubation opportunities in certain specific categories not addressed by Government supported schemes. 

Applicable conditions to gain access to incubation funds with different partners are given below:
TREC-STEP and Dept. of Science and Technology, Govt. of India:
1. All the finalists of Ventura 10 are eligible to apply for the DST innovation grant and Govt. of India's TePP incubation fund through TREC-STEP. 
2. The DST innovation grant is a onetime grant of up to 15,00,000 INR to be awarded for excellence in technical innovation.
3. The Govt. of India's TePP incubation fund is worth a total of approx.INR 10 million spread over different phases. TREC STEP and DST reserve the right to select any/none of the finalists for funding considerations. The funding is subject to mutual agreement between TREC STEP and the team.

VILLGRO Resources, Chennai:
1. Villgro shall provide incubation services to all relevant B-plans in Agriculture, Water, Dairy and Energy sector which have an impact on rural poor, coming out through the finals of Ventura 2010 which satisfies Villgro’s screening criteria.
2. Individual B-plans will be handled on a case by case basis and any incubation agreement will be made only when the B-plan originator and Villgro find each other mutually beneficial. Engagement model shall be arrived upon after discussions with the B-plan team. 
3. Villgro will provide a roster of experts to help mentor some of the short listed teams during the mentoring round of Ventura 10 .The eligible participants will have remote access to their respective mentors for guidance. 

NSRCEL, IIM Bangalore:
1. NSRCEL, IIM B offers incubation to all finalists of Ventura 10 by including them in the final stages of NSRCEL’s own selection procedure. NSRCEL reserves the right to select any/none of the finalists for actual incubation. 
2. NSRCEL, IIM B will provide Mentoring support for all the short listed participants of Ventura 10 to help them fine tune and iron out the wrinkle in their plans.
3. Two members from the winning team of Ventura'10 can take part in any one of the entrepreneurship workshops conducted by NSRCEL, IIM B