The 350 students who crowded into the Ed Burke on the 19th of February to see the much anticipated Ulster Bank Enterprise Competition were witness to one of the most exciting events to take place in Trinity this year. Organised by the Trinity Entrepreneurial Society, and based on the popular television show The Dragon Den, the event surpassed all expectations, especially considering it was its inaugural year for it to take place. It was the culmination of a great deal of effort by all involved in the society, as well as a great deal of preparation from the contestants. It proved to be an excellent exhibition of the talent, ambition and skills possessed by students in Trinity.

At 6pm that evening, the twenty seven entrants were each divided up into three different heats, in which they had three minutes to pitch their business plan in front of the panel of judges behind closed doors. The judging panel consisted of a number of highly regarded business people, including Paul Kelly (Ulster Bank), Dr. Mary Keating (Trinity Business School), Dr. Eoin O’ Neill (TCD Director of Entrepreneurship), Peter Sheridan (Enterprise Ireland) and Trinity business alumni; Alan Foy and Brendan Gaffney who are now of Venture Wave Learning. After a brief deliberation, the judges whittled down the original twenty seven entrants down to the final eight. This was an extremely tough decision, as the quality of the entrants was exceptional.

The eight entrants that qualified were then announced at 7pm. By this stage the atmosphere from the audience was fantastic. The contestants were eagerly awaiting their chance to pitch their ideas in their allocated time of three short minutes. With 2000 euro on offer for the winners, and two runners up prizes of 500euro each, there was a great deal at stake, and nerves were running high. By the end of the first presentation, the audience and judges were already left wanting more. The business plans were varied, as were the presentations. Different entrants took different approaches, some formal, some humorous, and some even benefited from the use of props. Perhaps the most daunting aspect of the night came at the end of their presentations; when contestants were challenged by the judges with tough questions about the viability of their plans. However, the Trinity students held their own!

At a time when the Irish Economy is experiencing unprecedented turmoil, there is a reliance on bright entrepreneurial minded people to drive us towards a recovery. And this competition provided everyone in attendance with reassurance that there are plenty of people like that around. Each of the contestants demonstrated creativity, courage, entrepreneurialism, self belief, and a pro active spirit by getting involved in this competition. Contestants ranged from first through to fourth year, and came from various disciplines, which was indicative of the wide appeal this event held. After the presentations were finished, the judges stepped outside to decide on the overall winners. Entrants were judged on originality, market feasibility, financial viability, and their ability to communicate their idea in their pitch.

The runner up prizes on the night were awarded to Freddy Culazzo (Business and Politics) and Hugh Hackett (Philosophy and Sociology), who worked together to come up with the idea of a loyalty card for local businesses which they entitled; “Eskimo Community Card,” which they believe could “re-vitalize local trade and communities by making it more desirable to shop locally and in independent outlets”. They displayed a strong business understanding and the judges accredited their idea as being very well thought out, and an excellent initiative. Fourth year student Amy Coghlan secured the other runner up position for her business plan “style sense”. Amy’s idea was to design a purse that fits inside a bra, which the judges believed, was a great combination of innovativeness and creativeness. Amy hinted that she had many more innovative products in mind, and has plans to extend her line.

First place was claimed by a team of fourth year Bess students Tim Arnold, Eoin O’Shea, and John O Reilly, who pitched the idea of “BurrEato” a mobile burrito bar which served Mexican style food. A superb presentation which clearly highlighted their main points impressed the judges, who were particularly complementary of the quality of their business plan and the real potential that their idea showed.

Being awarded the first place in the Trinity Enterprise Competition is a prestigious accolade, and will prove to be a useful launch pad to a successful future. Trinity Entrepreneurial Society is hoping that this event marks the first of what will hopefully be a long running tradition in Trinity. They envisage that this competition can and will grow in future years, and attract even more interest, and hopefully be accredited for the discovery of some of Ireland’s future entrepreneurs.

The enterprise competition followed on from a number of other successful events held by Trinity Entrepreneurial Society during the year. The first event held by TES was the Irish leg of the global speed networking tour, which was an event designed to unleash energy, share ideas and make connections fast as part of the global entrepreneurship week. The event was hosted in association with Oli Barrett, an expert speed networker who travelled around the world on this global speed networking tour which visited over 6 continents in the space of 3 weeks to places such as Hong Kong, Mexico City, Toronto, Johannesburg, Botswana, Singapore, Santiago, Kuala Lumpur, Sydney and San Francisco, and of course Dublin. Following this we held a very successful internship night, with over 300 students in attendance and companies such as A & L Goodbody, Deloitte, Ernst & Young, IBM, Google, KPMG, Procter and Gamble and Ulster Bank / Royal Bank of Scotland. In the months leading up to Christmas, we had the launch of our competition, and a series of workshops including how to design a business plan and set up your own business. We also held an assessment centre workshop in association with Ulster Bank, which was aimed at preparing students for this round in the search for jobs. January saw TES launch their speaker series. First in was Dermot Mannion, whose talk was extremely interesting and very topical as it was the same week of the proposal of the hostile takeover by Ryanair. The following week we welcomed Eddie Hobbs, who’s talked proved to be very topical, and resulted in a mini controversy surrounding some of the things he told TES members, which resulted in heated discussions on the Marian Finucane show and Matt Coopers show. This event was followed up by a talk given by Professor Igor Shvets entitled “Intelligent Energy Options for the Future”. A week on from that TES, in association with DUBES and the Law society hosted a talk by Dr. Gerard O’Hare, one of Northern Ireland’s most accomplished property developers and business entrepreneurs on Entrepreneurship for the Graduate, which proved extremely interesting for our members. With a few more high profile and interesting speakers in mind for trinity term there promises to be more exciting events in store for members of TES.