Grad students pitch entrepreneurial ideas in simulation of real-world investor meet

BYLINE: ANNA VELASCO News staff writer

BUSINESS EDUCATION

Students of the entrepreneurship class from the master's in health administration program at UAB got to feel real-world pressure Thursday as they made their final presentations before a panel of judges.

Six teams of students, all of whom are executives already in the health care field, fittingly made their pitches at Innovation Depot, the newly-opened business incubator partnership between the University of Alabama at Birmingham and the nonprofit Entrepreneurial Center.

Ideas ranged from launching a company that provides video-on-demand health education shows via cable to creating a 24-hour day-care company that would be onsite at companies, such as a hospital, that have workers around the clock.

Each team had only 10 minutes to present, about the time most entrepreneurs would be granted by would-be investors for a first meeting. The four outside judges asked questions about financing, financial projections and other assumptions underlying the business plans.

While none of the ideas is ready to go to market, the students had well-formed concepts, said Gerald Glandon, chairman of the health services administration department.

''We're trying to simulate the real world,'' Glandon said. ''It's as if they were pitching ideas to potential investors.''

Students in the executive master's health administration program spend one week a semester on campus and complete the rest of their course work through Internet distance learning while maintaining their full-time jobs.

EMAIL:avelasco@bhamnews.com