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Fox IMBA Students Help International Companies Enter the U.S. Market at Temple's 7th Annual International Venture Fair

Shortly after Temple University's 7th Annual International Venture Fair, Andrew Dugdale, CEO, ICDL already knew that traveling from the U.K. to the U.S. for Temple's International Venture Fair was a valuable investment.

 

Andrew DugdaleDugdale’s visit was the culmination of his collaboration with Fox School IMBA students Stan Ridgely and Andreas Michligk to promote his company ICDL in the U.S. ICDL makes sales software called the Sales Accelerator.

 

Said Dugdale, “We had a full room for the presentation and were flooded with inquiries at our table. Since the Fair I have already received one expression of interest from a venture capitalist and from several organizations interested in marketing ICDL’s Sales Accelerator.”

 

The ICDL market-entry plan was one of many plans presented to venture capitalists as part of Fox IMBA students’ Enterprise Management Consulting (EMC) practicum, taught by EMC faculty manager, T.L. Hill.

 

“Serving as consultants and project managers on EMC projects is an exciting way for students to bring together all they’ve learned in all their MBA classes,” said Hill.

 

These projects, introduced in 2001 to the IMBA curriculum, were then called Global Entrepreneurship in Technology (GET) projects.

 

At the Venture Fair, M.Moshe Porat, dean of The Fox School of Business explained, “This experience has been so important to our IMBA program, that this year we’re introducing this real-world experience for all MBA students and renaming the program the Enterprise Management Consulting Program or EMC.”

 

Incorporating the EMC into The Fox School’s curriculum demonstrates the School’s commitment to “action learning,” gaining knowledge within the context of real business situations.

 

For this year’s projects, global partners—Welingkar Institute of Management in India, Ecole Nationale des Ponts et Chausees (ENPC) School of International Management and the Ben Gurion University in Israel—helped spur relationships with participating companies.

 

Other international companies attending this year’s fair included:

  • Biosense, Ltd. (Israel), a specialized security service that uses a novel interface between software and dogs.
  • Dai-Ichi Karkaria, Ltd. (India), a company with expertise in the development and manufacture of high-performance specialty chemical firms.
  • Lane 4 Lane, Ltd. (UK), a leadership/high performance-consulting firm staffed by elite athletes and psychologists.
  • Lipton Informatique Conseil (France), specialized IT services for European financial services firms that are looking to enter the U.S. market.
  • Opthocare Ltd. (Israel), a company that is developing and commercializing special electronic eyeglasses for the treatment of Amblyopia (lazy eye) in children.

The fair war organized and hosted by Temple’s award winning Innovation and Entrepreneurship Institute (IEI) which is also responsible in identifying suitable consulting opportunities for Fox MBA students. Chris Pavlides, IEI’s Executive Director expressed great satisfaction at the large VC and entrepreneur turnout for the event and pride at the performance of IMBA students.

 

Also included were presentations from the first-prize winner, Cent.$.sible Kid$ and the second-prize winner, STUZO, of IEI’s May 3, 7th Annual Business Plan Competition. Cent.$.sible Kid$ plans to provide money-management programs for children throughout the U.S. Stuzo is an Internet-driven business that doubles as a marketplace for college students and an advertising forum for businesses that want access to the college market.

 

Dennis Alter, chairman and CEO, Advanta and Temple benefactor and alumnus, gave the keynote address stressing the growing importance of right-brain skills in business.

 

This past fall, Dennis Alter and his wife, Gisela, gave a $15-million-dollar transformational gift to The Fox School for a new state-of-the-art 7-story facility, Alter Hall, which will be completed by 2007.

 

In his talk, Alter combined his own ideas on innovation with those of twentieth-century figures as diverse as writer and mythology expert Joseph Campbell, screenwriter Christopher Vogler and baseball great Ted Williams.

 

“In an age when information is abundant, thinking can only take you so far,” said Alter. He shared with the audience how Advanta incorporates right-brain skills—empathy, storytelling, creativity--in its strategy through what he called, “the orchard,” a gathering of a diverse group of employees that meet in a non-threatening, non-hierarchical environment that fosters new ideas.

 

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