Global New Venture Challenge (GNVC)

Application Components

Feasibility Summary

Students must develop a 8-page feasibility summary outlining a business or idea. Common elements of a feasibility summary include:

What problem is it solving? – Value proposition
Who is the customer? – Initial target market (Hint – do a lot of prospective customer interviews)
How large is the market for this product? – Market size
Who are the competitors or competing technologies?
How will you make money? – Economics and projections
What is your go to market strategy? – Customer acquisition
Who is your team? – Specifically, why are you qualified and capable to start this business
What is the current status of the company, team and product/service?

Application Questions

Students must speak to the following topics about their business in short-answer responses. This section will serve as the Executive Summary to a team’s application:

Business description (50 words or less, please note that this info may be made available on marketing materials)
Problem this business is addressing (125 word limit)
Customer/beneficiary segment this business addresses (125 word limit)
Potential market size (125 word limit)
Competing or substitutable products (125 word limit)
Why is this the right team to launch this business? (125 word limit)
Key milestones/current status of business and/or estimated time to market (125 word limit)

Team Resumes

Resumes of each team member should be included in the application.

Apply to the 2025 GNVC

Eligibility Requirements

Only second-year Executive MBA students are eligible to apply for the Global New Venture Challenge.
Entries must be the original work of the entrants and have commercial promise.
- Each GNVC team must have a minimum of two second-year Executive MBA students per team and a maximum of six second-year Executive MBA students per team. Applicants may not have raised more than $500k of outside investment (angel or VC) at the time of application (personal investments do not apply to this cap).
- First-year Executive MBA students may participate in an advisory role and attend class, but will not receive credit for the course.
Teams whose founding members are unaffiliated with Chicago Booth are only eligible to apply to the GNVC if they have a current Chicago Booth second-year Executive MBA student as an integral part of their team, with a 10% equity stake in the venture.
- Teams may have members who are not affiliated with the Chicago Booth participate on their teams. The Polsky Center encourages teams to identify these individuals, as they likely contribute additional expertise and experience to help the team succeed.
  - No late submissions will be accepted.