The Competition
About the Competition
The Global Social Venture Competition is the world’s preeminent social business plan competition providing aspiring entrepreneurs with mentoring, exposure, and prize money to transform their business ideas into positive real-world impact. Its mission is to catalyze new sustainable ventures that address significant social issues, build awareness of the social entrepreneurship field and educate future leaders. Founded by MBA students at UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business, the GSVC has evolved into a global network supported by an international community of volunteer judges, mentors and student organizers and a partnership of premier business schools in the US, Europe, Asia, and Africa.
This year entrant teams from around the world will compete for $50,000 in prizes while gaining valuable professional feedback on their businesses. Since its inception in 1999, the GSVC has awarded over half a million dollars to promising social enterprises and introduced early-stage entrepreneurs to the venture capital community, creating a new generation of sustainable social ventures including Husk Power, Revolution Foods and d.light design.
The Global Social Venture Competition occurs over three rounds: an Executive Summary round, Regional Finals, and the Global Finals which take place at the Haas School of Business at UC Berkeley. During each round of the competition, social entrepreneurs present the social, financial, and environmental values of their business, gaining valuable feedback from and exposure to some of the greatest minds in social innovation.
How to Get Involved
Over 800 teams from around the world entered the 2011 competiton, but we think there are more of you out there. If you are interested in entering the competition in 2012, please sign up for our mailing list. Learn more about the competition, official rules, judging criteria, submission process and more using the links on the left. You can also follow us on twitter (@gsvc), or join our group on Facebook.
If you have questions, please refer to the FAQs page or contact .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).