If you want to compete in the New York Business Plan Competition (NYBPC), please remember to complete your initial registration (application) no later than Friday, March 1, 2024 using this link: https://bit.ly/2024NYBPC. For teams, only one member needs to register the entire team.

Please remember to mark your calendar for the Friday, April 5, 2024 in-person NYBPC pitching competition at SUNY Polytechnic Institute’s Kunsela Hall. 

The New York Business Plan Competition (NYBPC) project is designed for students to encourage the development of greater entrepreneurial capacity in New York State. SUNY Poly is the regional host for the Mohawk Valley. The competition is open to all students from all universities in our MV region, all disciplines, and all levels–both undergraduate and graduate. Students are encouraged to form diverse teams and collectively have fun developing their ideas. The competition gives students the opportunity to bring concepts for new useful and inventive technologies, processes, services, and organizations to life. Students do not need a background in business to join forces with others and enter the competition. Cross-disciplinary teams are encouraged.

During the day of the competition (Friday, April 5, 2024), student teams pitch their venture concepts in thematic tracks to judges who then give them feedback and rubric-based evaluations. The tracks are as follows: Food & Agtech; Health & Wellbeing; Learn, Work & Live; Safety, Power & Mobility; Products & Hardware; and Software & Services. Past student participants have remarked that the competition benefited them in several ways including becoming more capable through experiential learning, being nudged to finally develop their dream ideas for helping others, getting valuable feedback from expert judges, being recognized and awarded with cash prizes, and having the chance to get funding for their exciting new ventures.

Elias Zeina, a SUNY Poly alumni, past winner of NYBPC, and entrepreneur, further explains, "My experience with the NYBPC was transformative. Our professor ... guided my team and I through an intensive semester-long class where we brainstormed, collaborated, and executed a business idea. From the start, our team was connected with professionals that helped develop our idea into what could have been a practical and functioning business in our community. At the regional and state competitions, our team received a tremendous amount of constructive feedback from judges that helped refine our ideas even more. The entire process gave me the strategic planning and creative thinking skills as well as the confidence to open my own business. I recommend every student who wishes to embark on an entrepreneurial journey to go through this process… My entrepreneurial spirit was born at a young age however, I do not feel I would have the confidence and skills necessary to start my own business if it weren't for my experience with the NYBPC."

For an overview of the state-level competition structure, please see the following: 
2024 Rule Book 
Pitch Slide Deck Template 
NYBPC.org 
 
If you need advice or help with developing your concept or have general questions, please feel free to contact Professor Edgell (edgellr@sunypoly.edu).