Harvard Business School Alumni Bulletin

Entrepreneurs Win in Global Competitions

Winners of the second annual Alumni New Venture Contest, the 2011 Social Entrepreneurship Fellowship, and Student Business Plan Contest have been announced.

Representing the HBS Association of Northern California and the HBS Tech Alumni Club, BioMine, led by co-founder and CEO Privahini Bradoo (MBA '08), took top honors in the School's second annual Alumni New Venture Contest. BioMine uses existing scaled-up mining industry technologies to capture value from the 40 million tons of "e-waste" that is landfilled or incinerated annually around the world.

(Watch Bradoo explain the concept behind BioMine.)

The venture contest finalists, representing twelve U.S and international regions, presented business plans for their start-ups to judges on Monday, April 25, during the final round of competition.

On Tuesday, Rakhi Mehra (MBA '09), founder of micro Home Solutions, a social housing initiative for developing sustainable building, was named the Social Entrepreneurship Fellowship winner. The organization is based in New Delhi, India, where it provides economically viable housing solutions for under-served populations, starting with India and for communities around the world.

(Watch Mehra explain how she's using her MBA.)

The winners of the Student Business Plan Contest were Boss Medical and Baby.com.br, while SANA Care won in the social enterprise track.

More than 90 teams submitted entries as part of this year's Alumni New Venture Contest. Clubs in Boston, Brazil, Chicago, Germany, India, New York/Washington D.C., Northern California, Southern California/San Diego, Shanghai, South Africa, Toronto, and United Arab Emirates acted as regional hubs, and finalists were chosen in March through contests held around the world.

In addition to BioMine, the regional finalists, representing a wide variety of new enterprises from photovoltaics to automotive marketing, were as follows:

Africa Angus Rowe, OPM 38 2009 LifeQube mobile clinic management Watch their pitch. Asia-Pacific Oliver Segovia, MBA '10 Jennifer Kelly, MBA '10 AVA invitation-only shopping platform Watch their pitch. Canada Zaheed Poptia, MBA '06 CardSwap online giftcard marketplace Watch their pitch. Europe Alexander Azoulay, MBA '03 David Merle, MBA '03 Superdome building integrated photovoltaics India Vikram Sharma, MBA '06 Crossover Energy sustainable energy services Latin America Thomaz Srougi, GMP 6 2009 Dr. Consulta affordable healthcare solutions Watch their pitch.

Middle East Rohit Dev Thakwani, OPM 37 2008 SpendWisor.com consumer electronics marketplace Watch their pitch. Midwest/Central U.S. Marc Hoecker, MBA '08 vinsnap mobile automotive marketing Watch their pitch. New England Marco Bitran, MBA '03 AI Exchange hedge fund technology platform Mid-Atlantic/Southeastern U.S. Sahil Patel, MBA '05 PhytoTEK biologic infection solutions Watch their pitch. Northwestern U.S. Privahini Bradoo, MBA '08 BioMine e-waste mining solutions Watch their pitch. Southwestern U.S. Ali Fakhari, MBA '07 WikiPay mobile payment/marketing platform Watch their pitch.

Companies CardSwap and PhytoTEK were semifinalists, while AI Exchange received a mention at Monday's awards dinner as the winner of an informal popular vote.

Modeled after the HBS student Business Plan Contest, now in its 15th year, the Alumni New Venture Contest was designed to support promising new ventures founded by HBS graduates. As the winning entry, BioMine was awarded a $25,000 cash prize. Every finalist team received mentoring from an HBS faculty member prior to the judging and participated in on-campus sessions during the finals. The finals of the contest were judged by a panel of HBS faculty members and alumni from fields such as venture capital, consulting, law, accounting, life sciences, and technology. Legal services were sponsored by Cooley, LLP.