Bissett School of Business General Management students compete in Canada’s Business Model Competition
A team of 4th. year, General Management, BBA students were a “BBQ Rib” away from entering the Finals of Canada’s Business Model Canvas Competition (CBMC), held March 4-5th. at Dalhousie University.
Founder Zachary Hartley of “Smoke Barrel” and his teammate, Andrew Conway, were Semi-Finalists in this annual, national student competition. Over 45 student teams, ranging in backgrounds from Bachelor programs to PhD programs, competed for $50,000 in cash and prizes. Zac’s “Smoke Barrel”, a premium BBQ smoker, made from old wine and whisky barrels, has been launched and is already garnering consumer sales.
In the CBMC, Zac and Andrew earned a tie in their flight with a team of Master of Technology Entrepreneurship & Innovation from SMU of Halifax. However, the judges awarded the seat in the Finals to SMU on the “tie-breaking” social impact criteria.
This year’s winning business concept, an innovative allergy-testing product, was founded by PhD students from the University of Waterloo.
Douglas MacDonald, team coach, can attest that Zac and Andrew were noble ambassadors of the Bissett School of Business and garnered respect for their presentation, competitive and supportive spirit in addition to their business concept.
Canada’s Business Model Competition ® (CBMC) represents an innovative and alternative paradigm for post-secondary students to demonstrate their innovativeness and entrepreneurship. The CBMC uses the philosophy and approach of Alex Osterwalder’s ‘Business Model Canvas’ plus integrating Steve Blanks’ ‘The Lean Start-up Movement’. These tools use an approach driven by a question, hypothesis, and validation process to create innovative business models that solve real problems. Leading-edge universities such as Stanford, Harvard, BYU, Waterloo, UBC and Dalhousie in addition to innovative global companies have used these models. Over the past five years, our Entrepreneurship Program has also integrated these models into our curriculum. — Douglas MacDonald
Dalhousie’s 4th. Annual Competition is the Canadian qualifier for the International BMC, which will be held this April at Microsoft Campus, Redmond, Washington.
Team Coach, Douglas MacDonald, would like to acknowledge Ray DePaul for his mentorship of Zac and Andrew as well as the entire entrepreneurship team for fostering this type of entrepreneurial attitude and behavior
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The Bissett School of Business would like to congratulate Zak and Andrew on their efforts as well as acknowledge the dedication of their coach, Douglas MacDonald and the Department of Entrepreneurship for continuing to mentor and inspire the entrepreneurial spirit of our students.