Innovation Challenge Rules

Rules

 
  • You must be a UCLA student to participate in this competition. In this competition, “UCLA student” is defined as anyone pursuing an educational program at UCLA including UCLA Health residents, fellows, and post-docs.
  • The Cross-Campus Innovation Challenge is for new, independent ventures in the seed, start-up or early stage. Business plans cannot be venture-backed, although investments from friends and family are acceptable.
  • Teams are not allowed to change their registered team members after the submission of business plans. Please decide ahead of time how your team intends to split the prize money.
  • All teams will adhere to the UCLA Anderson Honor Code.

Team Formation

 
  • At least one UCLA MBA student and one non-MBA UCLA student must be a member of the team.
  • The maximum size of a team is five students.
  • Students may be a part of more than one team during the qualifying review. However, if more than one of their teams make it to the finals, they must select one team to be a part of.
  • We encourage you to participate in networking sessions, use Slack and the team formation Google sheet to connect with potential team members.
  • Use the team formation Google sheet to find team/team members:
    • If you have a healthcare idea/team and are looking for members to join your team, visit this page.
    • If you have a sustainability idea/team and are looking for members to join your team, visit this page.
    • If you have a generative AI idea/team and are looking for members to join your team, visit this page.
    • If you are a participant and are looking for interesting teams to join, visit this page.
  • Join the Innovation Challenge Slack to communicate with other participants. Request to be added to the Innovation Challenge Slack is HERE.
  • Should you need additional help finding a team/member, please contact Connor Dougherty, Innovation Challenge Program Manager at connor.dougherty@anderson.ucla.edu.

Business Plan

 
  • We advise plans to be up to 25 (typed and double-spaced) pages of text, including the executive summary and summary financial data.
  • Appendices should follow the text portion of the plan with detailed spreadsheets and other appropriate data.
  • A repository of example business plans and pitch decks can be found HERE.

Final Round

 
  • Each team will be given 15 minutes to pitch, followed by a 10 minute Q&A session.
  • Judges will evaluate the finalists’ written plans a week prior to the final pitch day.
  • The final decision is based on the judges’ qualitative evaluation and consultations with each other during their deliberation session following the pitches.
  • A panel of judges will be drawn from venture capitalists, angel investors, faculty, business executives, entrepreneurs and subject matter experts in healthcare and sustainability.

 

Prize Money

 
  • Prize money amount will be determined by sponsorship and participation level.
  • Please note that the prize money is considered taxable income thereby subject to federal and state income tax.

Leaders in Sustainability Conference

 
Participation in the Innovation Challenge helps partially fulfill the IoES Leaders in Sustainability Certificate Program certificate requirement. For additional information, please contact Harrison Levy, IoES Graduate Program Advisor, at hlevy@ioes.ucla.edu.

Disclosure

 

Due to the nature of the competition, we will not ask judges, reviewers, or staff to agree to or sign non-disclosure statements for any participant. By participating in the competition, participants agree that neither UCLA Anderson, the Easton Center, nor their designate organizations assume any liability whatsoever for any disclosures of business plan information which may be made (whether inadvertently or otherwise) by any judge, reviewer, staff member, or other individuals connected with, participating in, viewing, hearing, or receiving information from the competition.