Winners! - University of San Francisco Business Plan Competition (2008)

Now the results from the 2008 University of San Francisco International Business Plan Competition:

Grand Prize
Carnegie Mellon University - Dynamics
"Dynamics has invented a low-cost paper-thin, flexible computer. The platform technology is piloting as a security card solution. A proven credit card solution eliminates $22.5 billion of fraud annually by changing a portion of your credit card number both visually (via a display) and magnetically (via a programmable magnetic stripe)."

Second Place
Duke University - Cerene Biomedics
"We are developing an implantable medical device to prevent focal epileptic seizures by delivering targeted thermoelectric cooling to the brain. Brain cooling has been proven to eliminate seizure on-sets; however this has been technologically unfeasible to date. Our device could provide first-line therapy for ~230,000 US refractory epileptic patients."

Finalists
Stanford University - Endurance Rhythm
MIT - Project Einstein
University of Michigan - GIDEON

The University of San Francisco Team led by recent USF EMBA alum, Rob Lahaderne, and leveraging a Lawrence Livermore National Lab technology as part of a new USF-LLNL cooperative effort, gave an outstanding performance, coming in a close second in a highly competitive life science division and earning an Honorable Mention for the contest. Rob will compete again soon in the Draper Fisher Jurvetson Competition.

"New Form Medical Devices: USF
New-Form Medical Devices incorporates Shape Memory Plastics (SMP) to reduce blood trauma from hemodialysis. This business venture has been organized to design, evaluate, and launch medical devices that use SMP as designed and evaluated at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. These components will be targeted to hemodialysis centers and home users."

The Professor John Miller Team Spirit Award went to a courageous can-do team from Cambridge University.

The Sustainable Business Award went to an alternative energy proposal from Yale University.

The other award winners will be listed on the University of San Francisco Entrepreneurship Program website shortly.

University of San Francisco Entrepreneur Team Wins 3rd place in Business Plan Competition

Congratulations to Tom Monaghan (University of San Francisco, EMBA 2007) and Tesh Khullar (University of San Francisco, EMBA 2006) for their outstanding achievement in winning 3rd place in the National Seed Business Plan Competition in Santa Barbara last weekend.

Tom and Tesh were one of 10 teams invited from among the 72 applications for the contest. They edged out teams from Harvard and Univ. of Wisconsin-Madison and others for one of the 4 finalist positions.

They will compete again at the San Diego State University Business Plan Competition (the nation's oldest event) next week.

Private Equity in Education?

Laureate Education accepted a $3.5+ bln offer from an investor group that includes KKR.

With regard to Laureate, I am curious to see if and how private equity begins to creep into the public education arena - private equity is already purchasing mega-sized infrastructure projects such as toll roads and bridges. It is not much of a stretch to think that the private equity model of efficiency gains and increased organizational effectiveness would be a solution to attritting school performance acorss the US. The demands of taxpayers are constantly increasing. The competition for entrance to colleges and universities is cutthroat. Creeping into the for-profit education sector could be the first step into a foray to public education sector.

Private Equity & the Publishing Industry

Apax acquired Thomson Learning for over $7+ billion - nearly the same sale price as Chrysler!

Pearson plc recently acquired eCollege for approximately $500 mln., despite Pearson’s strategic partnership with Blackboard, Inc., a direct competitor to eCollege. Additionally, this price reflects a value nearly equal to eight times revenue and 20 times EBITDA.

I am closely monitoring the current and proposed transactions in the publishing industry. With over seven years of experience in this industry, I believe that there are significant inefficiencies that exist within the market participants. The major publishing houses maintain internal brand and production silos within their organizations, often duplicating product development, sales, and distribution services. In these cases, there are opportunities to divest these brand silos individually, with the sum of parts worth more than the whole and thus providing an opportunity for an experienced private equity fund to execute these transactions profitably.

In addition, traditional publishing companies have been challenged by an increasing number of distribution competitors, such as used books sellers overseas and new technology companies offering customizable, user-generated content. Companies with modernized distribution channels versus traditional publishers (such as the relationship of News Corporation and Dow Jones) will be able to leverage these channels to better meet market demands, and again give rise to a profitable outcome.

These industry conditions present an interesting value proposition for private equity firms experienced in capitalizing on these types of market inefficiencies, resulting in more effective and profitable companies. I suspect that this may be a main proponent of Apax Partners’ cash purchase for Thomson Learning, a price considered to be exorbitant by some executives within the publishing industry.