Texas undergrads honored in global entrepreneurship competition

by PegNews wire

The Global Student Entrepreneur Awards (GSEA) -- the "Heisman Trophy" for the top undergraduate student business owners -- held its first regional competition for 2007 on the campus of Texas Christian University in Fort Worth, Texas. The GSEA program, which has attracted over 500 nominees from the US, Canada, China, Australia, Spain, Mexico, Sweden and Puerto Rico, provides recognition to the undergrad who is balancing the pressures of a full college workload alongside the pressures of running a growing business.

The winner of the Texas regional competition was Tim Hamilton, University of Texas - Austin. Hamilton was recognized for his business Astonish Designs, which is a web design and development company. Hamilton said "I am excited to win the award for Texas and look forward to competing in the GSEA Global Finals in Chicago this November. The day was awesome and I received some great feedback from the entrepreneurs that judged."

The competition had a unique twist with live presentations to a panel which included members of the Entrepreneurs' Organization such as UT - Arlington alum Jeff Smith -- founder and CEO of SensorLogic and also founder of OnRamp Technologies, which became one of the largest Web-hosting companies in the world. Each participant had 20 minutes to present on their business, sales growth, their mission and obstacles overcome and then the judges asked questions to dig deeper. Following the presentation each student was scored and the judges took the time to provide a sheet of feedback and mentorship on how the student could improve their business.

Second place went to Jeff Livney of Livney+Partners -- who will also be representing Texas at the GSEA Global Finals. Austin Hoffman, author of Guerilla Garage Sales and founder of Coleto Collectibles and Michael McKenzie of The McKenzie Group tied for third place. Both are students at Texas Christian University.

Source: Global Student Entrepreneur Awards