Why Darden MBA

Archives: Entrepreneurship News at Darden

Academic Year 2008-2009

Professor Sarasvathy Appointed to Darden's Isidore Horween Research Chair (July 2009)

Dean Bruner has announced that Associate Professor Saras Sarasvathy, who teaches an Entrepreneurial Thinking course as well as a Starting New Ventures course for Darden full-time MBA students, has been appointed for a 3-year term to the Isidore Horween Research Chair. Made possible by the late Ralph Horween and his son, Frederick Stow (Darden '58), this Research Chair supports entrepreneurship research, specifically in the area of launching and managing small businesses.

Darden Incubator Students Win $250k in DFJ-Cisco Global Business Plan Competition

Out of 1,000 international business plan entries, Husk Power Systems, founded by two Darden '09 alumni (recently one of the Darden Business Incubator companies) won the top prize. Congratulations, Husk Power entrepreneurs! Read more about this innovative green start-up venture powering Indian villages using recycled rice husks:

Darden Business Incubator and Darden Business Plan Competition Winners in the News

Darden Business Incubator's Summer 2009 program starts on May 27.

Good luck to all our new incubatees!

100 Terrific Twitter Feeds for Young Entrepreneurs by Tiffany Davis

Small Business Roundtable with Senator Warner Held at Darden

First Annual UVA Venture Summit

The UVA Venture Summit was sited on the Clear Admit Blog.

"The First Annual UVA Venture Summit will provide a glimpse into the future. The University of Virginia-wide summit, the brainchild of Darden School of Business Second Year student Adair Newhall under the guidance of Darden’s Director of Entrepreneurship Programs Philippe Sommer, will showcase the creative vision of UVA’s most innovative researchers and entrepreneurs to the venture capital community on April 3 and 4." And on Sat., April 4, from 9am to 12pm is the UVA Entrepreneur Interactive Showcase session(at Darden, in Classroom 50.)

Congratulations, Clean India, and all winners and finalists in the 2009 Darden-UVA Business Plan Competition!

  • 1st Place ($10,000): Clean India – Baijnath Ramraika, Chip Ransler, Pramod Dangi, Ravi Yekula, Dr. Ganti Murthy
  • 2nd Place ($4,000): Audiallo – Aaron Nelson, Brian Degnan, Luis Calderon
  • 3rd Place ($1,000): Smart Wallet – Trese Meawad
  • 4th Place ($500): Phthisis – Brian Loyal, Crystal Icenhour, Elizabeth Coleman, Elizabeth Pyle, Eric Houpt
  • Finalists:
    • Energy Guardian – Gordon Avery, Frank Irving, Mark Hanson, Mateja Putic
    • Ethics-LX – Don Kendrick, Jeremy Leahman, Katherine Gronberg, Tony Naidu
    • Telemed Africa – Keith Florance, Scott Emami

Clean India won for Darden in the Social Entrepreneurship category at Wake Forest's 2009 Elevator Competition

To make it to the finals, teams had just two minutes in an elevator with a judge to make their strongest pitch. Those who made the finals then presented their plan in twenty minutes to the judges. The winning Darden team included Ravi Yekula, Baijnath Ramraika, and Chip Ransler. Their prize was $5,000.

Congratulations to the Darden team for winning the Entrepreneur's Choice Award at the Northeast Regional Venture Capital Investment Competition (VCIC) hosted by NYU on March 6, 2009

Huan Tran, Gunjan Shukla, Matthew Gunther, Kevin Martin and Matthew Fedors represented Darden. Six teams competed to advance to the finals. Darden team is pictured below.

Read "Darden Student's Quarter in India Ramps Up Rice Husk Power Company" (UVA TODAY) March 26, 2008.

Congratulations to the team from UNC's Kenan-Flagler Business School for winning the Southeast Regional VCIC hosted at Darden on Friday, February 20, 2009.

E*Society Fosters Collaboration and Entrepreneurship in Tough Economy

(UVA Today) February 7, 2009.

Thanks to everyone who joined us for E*Bootcamp on February 6, 2009. Over 100 students, alumni, and members of the community attended to learn the nuts and bolts of how to start a company. View schedule.

Forbes – 1/20/09 Timely tips for recession-racked entrepreneurs by Maureen Farrell - Philippe Sommer (Director of Entrepreneurship Programs) quoted in the article

Husk Power Systems

Cofounded by two current Darden student entrepreneurs profiled in New York Times on Dec. 24, 2008. Cofounders Manoj Sinha and Chip Ransler were awarded a 2008 Pop!Tech Social Innovation Fellowship and a grant from the Shell Foundation. See "Young Innovators Learn to Pitch Big Ideas" in the Christian Science Monitor about these and other Pop! Tech fellows. Their company, Husk Power Systems, was also named as one of the Fast Company Social Enterprises of the Year (an honor roll of top nine social enterprises for 2008) in the December issue of Fast Company.

Philippe Sommer and Darden's Business Incubator

Philippe Sommer and Darden's Business Incubator were featured on WMRA News on Dec. 10: "Venture Capital in a Down Economy". Want to see which companies were started by Darden students? Take a look at Ventures Supported by the Darden Business Incubator.

Darden Sweeps Innovation Challenge

Congratulations to the two winning teams, Team Wildhoos (overall winners & winners of the AmericanExpress Open award) and Team Alchemy (winners of the Hilton award). They faced competition from students from 55 schools and 48 countries.

Congratulations to the Winners of the Darden-UVA Business Concept Competition

First place in Consumer Goods & Services went to TeleMed Africa (Scott Emami, Keith Florance, Manoj Sinha, and Henri Van Canneyt). First place in Life Sciences & High Tech went to Clean India (Ravi Kiran Yekula, Baijnath Ramraika and Gani Murthy).

VibeAgent, a company started in the Darden Business Incubator, was cited in PE Week wire, venturebeat.com, and techcrunch.com for raising $3 million in angel funds.

The 2008 Innovation Challenge is mentioned on American Chronicle, 11/11: "Entrepreneurship and innovation are at the head of the class"

Philippe Sommer and Darden Alumni Entrepreneurs featured on NPR's All Things Considered (Nov. 6)

Entrepreneurs take risks despite downturn by Tamara Keith

Entrepreneur Magazine Recently Ranked Darden in Top 20 Graduate Programs in Entrepreneurship

(October 2008 Entrepreneur)

Craig Misrach, a Darden Business Incubator participant, now President & CEO of Freedom Meditech, has been in the news: Freedom Meditech  has just received a JumpStart equity investment of $380,000 (September 2008) as part of their Series A financing.

Two Darden Faculty Have Won Entrepreneurship Awards

S. Venkataraman has received the inaugural IDEA Award for Foundational Research from the Academy of Management’s Entrepreneurship Division, for his 1997 paper “The Distinctive Domain of Entrepreneurship Research.”

Saras Sarasvathy has just been named the 2008 Falcone Distinguished Scholar in Entrepreneurship by Syracuse University's Whitman School of Management. She presented a lecture at Syracuse entitled "Made as Well as Found: Researching Entrepreneurship as a Science of the Artificial" on October 17.

 Easy Ways to Stay in the Loop:

  1. Join Darden's Entrepreneurship and Venture Capital Club (EVC Club) and the university-wide E*Society! Sign up for their email lists.
  2. Read about the events on the timeline above and put them and their application deadlines on your calendar. Set up reminders!
  3. Introduce yourself to Philippe Sommer, Director of Darden's Entrepreneurship Programs.

Support for Darden's Entrepreneurship Program is provided by the Batten Endowment.

top of page