The Santander Universities Entrepreneurship Awards offer a fantastic opportunity for student and graduate entrepreneurs. Not only will the Awards help bring cash investment to aid students with their business ideas, but they will also provide the winners with valuable press coverage through the recognition received from this initiative.
The Santander Universities UK Division has been in operation since 2007 and currently has partnerships with 66 universities in the UK. The aim of these awards is to offer increased support in the form of funding for young entrepreneurs who have either recently graduated from or who are still studying at The Open University. Students are invited to participate in this scheme by submitting a business plan for either the Undergraduate or Postgraduate category.
All business plans will be assessed internally and one business plan for each category will be nominated and entered into the Santander Entrepreneurship Awards Competition. The Open University entries will be assessed together with those from other Universities by a selected panel of judges from Santander’s Business and Corporate Banking Divisions.
The top five candidates from each category will be invited to attend a judging day on either the 24 or 25 June 2013, where they will be asked to give a 20 minutes presentation of their business plan followed by 10 minutes for any questions. The final awards will be announced at a Santander Universities reception on the 25 June 2013.
Awards: Undergraduate Postgraduate
1st Prize £5,000 1st Prize £20,000
2nd Prize £3,000 2nd Prize £10,000
3rd Prize £1,000 3rd Prize £5,000
Those interested in entering this competition, should submit a business plan to Wendy.King@open.ac.uk by Tuesday 26 March 2013, who can also provide further details of the scheme. Please consider the further details of the scheme carefully, as they will provide critical information on the submission and judging criteria.