Introducing the 2025 Bulldog Pitch Competition
At the College of Business at Ferris State University
Submit Entry Form
Timeline
- February 21, 2025: Initial submissions due (online)
- March 7, 2025: Finalists notified and invited to on-campus pitch event
- April 11, 2025: On-campus pitch event
The Student Experience
- High school students are invited to form teams of 1-5 to work on a business startup
idea
- Teams submit the application form and 2-minute explainer video by February 21
- Finalist teams will be notified by March 7 and invited to Pitch Event in Big Rapids
on April 11
- Finalist teams prepare their 10-minute pitch and slide deck and pitch to a jury of
entrepreneurs and faculty on April 11
- Finalist teams will receive feedback on their startup ideas from jury
- First, second, and third place teams win prizes!
- All finalist teams will have opportunities to enjoy other on-campus activities
Bulldog Pitch Competition is grounded in BAMO standards
- Employ entrepreneurial discovery strategies to generate feasible ideas for business
ventures
- Develop a concept for a new business venture
- Evaluate a new business venture concept’s potential for success
- Determine the resources needed for start-up viability of a business venture
Eligibility and Guidelines
- The startup idea should be an innovative business concept (i.e., new product/service
invention, or a significant incremental innovation of an imitative/existing business
concept).
- The business or idea must be majority-owned (over 50%) by a student.
- It must be an independent business venture in the start-up ideation or very early
growth stage (i.e., not part of an existing business, and only in the idea stage or
very early startup stage).
- Business concepts can be for-profit or nonprofit.
- Businesses/teams with aggregate sales, investments, grants, or competition awards
under $5000 since the legal entity was established are eligible to compete.
- If a legal entity has been formed, the earliest incorporation date must be after April
1, 2024.
- It is NOT a requirement that students register a legal business entity for the competition.
- All team members must be currently enrolled at their respective high school.
- Teams may consist of 1 to 5 students.
Resources
Participating students should utilize the following resources to help them succeed
in this competition:
Video Resources
Additional Resources
- Lean Canvas (Word document download) referenced in video 5 of the instructional videos linked above
Questions, issues, or concerns?
Contact us at [email protected]
Contestants should be aware that neither administrators of the competition nor judges
of the business plan will be required, nor should they be asked, to sign non-disclosure
agreements (NDA). Contestants are encouraged to be selective about what they disclose,
to label plans and contents with the words CONFIDENTIAL AND PROPRIETARY, and to seek
legal counsel if they have any further questions regarding the legal protection of
their ideas. All public sessions of the Competition, including but not limited to
oral presentations and question/answer sessions, are open to the public at large.
Any and all of these public sessions may be broadcast to interested persons through
media which may include radio, television, and other internet channels. Any data or
information discussed or divulged in public sessions by entrants should be considered
information that will likely enter the public realm, and entrants should not assume
any right of confidentiality in any data or information discussed, divulged, or presented
in these sessions. Event organizers and attendees may make photocopies, photographs,
video recordings, and/or audio recordings of the presentations including all materials
prepared for use in a pitch presentation and disseminate said materials in any promotional
form.