Monaco, March 1st 2022
Mark Challenge is delighted to announce that 112 teams coming from 46 international Universities and Business Schools will participate in the 9th edition of the competition. Registered teams group 299 students and professionals representing 49 nationalities.*
This year, the highest number of applications came from institutions in the United Kingdom, Italy and France with 9, 9 and 8 Universities and Business Schools registered respectively.
Mark Challenge 2022
Mark Challenge is a business plan competition, powered by the International University of Monaco (IUM), aiming at connecting students and professionals with community leaders and academic professionals. The competition is conducted in the form of a pitch, and the projects must meet the following prerequisites:
- Be a luxury or premium product/service
- Have an international scope
- Have an environmental or social impact
- Target High Net Worth and/or Ultra High Net Worth Individuals
IUM organizes the competition with the support of a committee consisting of University faculty, students, and alumni communities, as well as local and international professionals.
For the 9th edition, we have 2 categories of competing teams:
- category 1: Bachelor students, Master students (only teams of 2-4 are allowed to compete);
- category 2: MBA, Executive MBA, Alumni, professionals with or without university degree (NEW: mono entrepreneurs will be allowed to compete alone).
They will compete in 3 qualifying rounds:
- Round 1: submission of business concept
- Round 2: submission of business plan
- Round 3: online battles on April 22nd (further details will be announced)
The 6 Finalist teams, proposed by Jury 2 and confirmed or modified with the Online Battles, will have the opportunity to pitch their entrepreneurial ideas to the final Jury.
If sanitary situation permits, the Grand Final 2022 will be held in the prestigious location of the Monaco Yacht Club on May 19th, 2022. Otherwise, the event will be held online the same day.
During the Grand Final, besides the Best Business Plan awards for category 1 and 2, two Special Awards will be conferred:
- Fashion and Accessories,
- Yachting;
Prizes
Each winning team of category 1 and category 2 will receive the following prizes from our sponsors:
- A Sales Optimization Workshop worth 3.000 EUR offered by Neos Chronos
- A Premium Virtual Business Card offered by VBC – Virtual Business Card
The Special Award in Yachting is proudly sponsored by Yachting Ventures and in partnership with the Monaco Yachting Cluster.
The Winner will be awarded a fully sponsored spot on Yachting Ventures’ next accelerator program, as well as access to all of the support, mentorship, and community resources offered via the Yachting Ventures platform.
More prizes will be announced in the coming weeks.
Registrations for the ninth edition of the Mark Challenge are now closed. Registered teams will have until March 14th to upload the requested documents for Submission 1.
First Round Jury Members
- Jukka Aminoff
- Glyn Atwal
- Matilde Bini
- Andrea Bookhagen
- Giovanni Luigi Bordone
- Alessandro Brun
- Eleonora Cattaneo
- George Christodoulides
- Julien de Grandbois
- Alberto Festa
- Bilal Hassan
- Marko Majer
- Guido Mantovani
- Jan Erik Meidell
- Julia Riedmeier
- Marika Taishoff
For more information about the Mark Challenge and to stay up to date on all the latest news, please visit our website and social media pages (LinkedIn, Instagram, Facebook).
*please note that numbers of the 9th edition indicated in this document can be different from the ones published on our website as participants could name their institutions in different ways during the online registration or create an account twice.
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