Spring 2007 E-Mail Newsletter  |
SPRING 2007 E-MAIL NEWSLETTER | | |||||||||||||||||||||
Welcome to our inaugural issue of Price College's electronic newsletter, Price Update. Though I am new to Price College, having assumed the dean’s role shortly after the first of the year, I truly am excited about what the college is doing and its future. In this issue of Price Update, we will share with you some exciting news and highlight a few of our outstanding student programs. Price College is one of the beneficiaries of a recent $1.1 million scholarship gift from Chesapeake Energy Corporation. In 2003, Chesapeake agreed to provide OU with $500,000 over a five-year period to enhance business and energy-related facilities, equipment and courses. This most recent gift increases Chesapeake's academic support to $1.6 million. Our energy management and management information systems students will greatly benefit from Chesapeake's generosity. What a thrill and honor it was for me to be present as our students once again walked away with top honors in the 2007 Donald W. Reynolds Governor’s Cup business plan competition. Students from 12 campuses across Oklahoma competed for cash prizes totaling more than $100,000. Our graduate division students brought home first-place as well as third-place trophies. Price College undergraduate students brought home second-place honors. Our entrepreneurship students are proving that they have what it takes to apply knowledge from the classroom and start businesses based on their business plans. I join their professors in wishing them well as they pursue their future ventures. Price College hosted the 2007 Big 12 MBA Case Competition finale as well as the southern regional competitions, and we are pleased to have placed second overall. We are grateful to the many faculty, student teams and staff who made this event a great success. Our undergraduate integrated business core (IBC) curriculum ties class work with “real world” business experience. Students build business plans, secure financing, work with vendors and market products all within the context of this class experience. The profits from IBC go to charity with donations to date exceeding $700,000 and more than 30,000 hours of student volunteer time. We are pleased to recently have welcomed Michael Price to campus as a speaker in our Student Investment Fund class. Mr. Price, who serves as chair of the board of Franklin Mutual Advisers Inc., Franklin Mutual Series Fund Inc. and managing partner of MFP Investors LLC, funded the class with an initial gift of $100,000. The fund has since grown to a value in excess of $400,000. Our students are apparently putting Mr. Price’s advice into action. Finally, in addition to my appointment as dean, we have added a number of new faculty and staff this past year. In particular, I would like to bring to your attention Steve Long as our new director of energy management. Steve has had a distinguished career in the energy industry and brings his valued leadership to our highly acclaimed energy management program. We hope you enjoy this inaugural edition of Price Update and welcome your reactions. Ken
Kenneth R. Evans, Dean and Fred E. Brown Chair A Generous Gift Price College is one of the beneficiaries of a gift from Chesapeake Energy Corporation. Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Aubrey K. McClendon presented a check for $1.1 million to OU officials during a welcome reception for Price College’s new dean, Kenneth R. Evans and Steve Long, new director of energy management. The gift will assist with student scholarships and course enhancements within the Price College of Business, the College of Earth and Energy and the College of Law. Price College Teams Shine Through the Storm Not even a stormy afternoon could dim the shining moment for Price College entrepreneurship students, as three teams walked away with trophies and cash prizes during the 2007 Donald W. Reynolds Governor’s Cup collegiate business plan competition. The competition took place over two months and culminated in an evening awards gala on April 24 at the Coca-Cola Bricktown Events Center in Oklahoma City.
Of the six Price College undergraduate teams making the semifinals, three of those teams made it to the final round. Two Price College graduate division teams were finalists. “We couldn’t be happier with our students,” said Lowell Busenitz, McCasland Professor of American Free Enterprise and academic team adviser. “The real exciting part for me is the fact that of the five teams that made the finals, four are actively seeking to go forward and start businesses based on their business plans.” Begun in 2005, the Donald W. Reynolds Governor’s Cup competition is a statewide business plan competition. It is open to students enrolled at any of Oklahoma’s universities or colleges. Teams must be a technology-based seed, start-up or early stage venture, addressing the entire business concept, including implementation. Each business plan undergoes an independent review by 40 community and business leaders, and scores are based on criteria for the written aspect of the plan. These scores determine which teams move forward to the oral competition, where an additional 20 judges listen to the teams present their concepts and answer questions. “Our entrepreneurship students are challenged to think through creative ideas for starting new businesses, giving them experience that goes beyond the classroom. Our students are required to write business plans around those ideas. They participate in team-building activities, gain access to networks of successful entrepreneurs and community leaders and make presentations to lenders and investors. Many times, it results in real dollars for use as capital to implement their ideas,” said Busenitz. Price College core entrepreneurship classes are taught by Busenitz, Jeff Schmidt, Jeff Wallman and Jim Wheeler. David Williams, director of the ConocoPhillips Business Communications Center, serves as presentation coach for the teams. Winning first place in the 2007 Oklahoma Governor’s Cup competition graduate division, including a $20,000 cash prize and the Innovation Award ($25,000 of in-kind services), was Worksmart Instruments. Worksmart uses technology developed at OU. The Intelligent Asphalt Compaction Analyzer (IACA) is a revolutionary monitoring device integrating speed, temperature, pressure and displacement variables, resulting in a real-time measure of the compaction density in the field. Winning third place in the graduate division and a $5,000 cash prize was Veracity Data Solutions. Veracity provides outsourced billing solutions for cellular telephone companies, utilizing an easy-to-use web interface that can be kept up-to-date with current roaming contracts. In the undergraduate category, winner of $10,000 and second place, was OPTima Solutions, a physical therapy management solution that integrates all clinical and business functions into a unified software suite. This year’s Oklahoma Governor’s Cup competition, managed by i2E Inc., attracted 14 graduate and 21 undergraduate teams, totaling 125 students from 12 university campuses across the state. [Top] MBA Students Place in Case Competition Price College's case competition team, consisting of Linda Bridges, Sara Eddleman, Rumen Nikolov and Thomas Ratliff, placed second in the final round of the 2007 Big 12 MBA Case Competition. The team was coached by management professor Mark Sharfman. Case competitions give students roles as management consultants. They must analyze a business situation for a panel of judges who act as the company's management board. Price College hosted both the regional and final rounds this year, the fifth year of hosting such competitions. Next year Baylor University will host the regional event and the finals will take place in Kansas City. IBC Means Real-world Experience What began in 1995 as an opportunity for students to create and manage two significant enterprises - a start-up company and a community service project - has become one of the competitive advantages for students studying at Price College.
“Starting a business is not just about opening a garage door and selling a product,” said Shelly Grunsted, clinical lecturer of legal studies and director of the IBC program. “What we want to do, essentially, is model a company from scratch for 16 weeks. What I think this gives our students is a true perspective - a small taste - of what it’s like to start a business. They’ve learned in the classroom about the legal side of business, how to market products and how to manage a company. This lets them go beyond the classroom; it lets them actually experience it.” IBC students enroll in 12 academic hours, including principles of management, principles of marketing, legal studies and the entrepreneurship/community service practicum. It is a unique classroom experience that allows students, over a semester, to start a business and then market and sell their products. Students first must develop a business plan to establish a start-up company. The company is responsible for developing a product or service, selling that product or service and donating volunteer hours and all profits to charities that serve the Norman area. Since the program’s inception, more than $700,000 and more than 30,000 volunteer hours have benefited the community. Charities such as Habitat for Humanity, Special Olympics, the Make-A-Wish Foundation, the American Red Cross, and numerous hospitals and schools have been the recipients of the students’ profits and service hours or “sweat equity.”
Under the supervision of several faculty members, students, who work in teams of 16 to 22, literally are responsible for doing it all, said Grunsted. “They must pitch their ideas and do a loan presentation to First Fidelity Bank. They may ask for $5,000, but only receive $1,000. Just as in the real world, the bank bases their loan on what they feel is feasible. Students also must work with product licensing. They then go to work on advertising and marketing. They actually experience the day-to-day activities involved in running a business from financial statements to marketing plans and management objectives to issues dealing with contracts and employment law.” Students come out of the IBC program not only with real-world experience, but memories that carry into their careers. “Students often say when they exit the program that it was one of the most - if not the most - rewarding college experiences they’ve ever had,” said Grunsted. A recent IBC student agrees. “IBC taught me valuable, real-world business skills that will reap benefits far into the future,” said Ben Lepak, who served as company president for Sooners in the Hood. “The leadership experiences involved with being a company president were particularly rewarding.” Michael Price Speaks to Finance Students
The Student Investment Fund class received first-hand advice when Michael Price visited the class to speak about value investing and the current financial market. With an initial $100,000 “seed money” gift from Price in the fall of 1996, Price business students gained something important to them - real experience. That initial investment by Price has grown to more than $400,000, thanks to the solid investing efforts of Price students. Students enrolled in the Student Investment Fund class are divided into groups of three to four students, and each group concentrates on a different industry sector, including transportation, energy or banking. Each group is responsible for evaluating and monitoring the stocks in the portfolio it “inherits” from the prior semester. Groups also are responsible for recommending stocks to add to the portfolio from within their assigned industry, following a “value style” approach to investing. Value investing, according to finance professors, in essence, is the process of identifying and investing in securities that currently are under or over valued in the stock market. “Students must write a 10-page report and post it to the Desire to Learn site. Everyone in the class must read it before the group can make a pitch to buy, and everyone else in the class must write a critique about the proposal to buy,” said Stock. After a question and answer period, students vote on whether or not to buy the stock. “The students decide on how much of a majority is needed to actually buy the stock - normally it is two-thirds. They take the decision seriously. The presenting group actually leaves the room while the others vote. They also are serious about their performance and take great pride in getting strong returns,” said Stock. New Director of Energy Management Hired
Longtime energy executive Steve Long recently was named director of the energy management program for Price College. Long comes to OU from PFC Energy, where he specialized in providing strategic advice, conducting competitive analysis and raising funds for companies expanding into new domestic and international oil and gas markets. From 1977-86, he worked for Gulf Oil Corp. as a business administrative trainee, financial analyst, senior budget analyst and manager of international economics and finance. He was named manager of corporate finance for Enron Corp. in 1987, and later was promoted to manager of strategic planning and competitive analysis. In 1991, he was named director of international business development. Long left Enron in 1996 to begin work for Unocal Corp., where he was vice president of development for South America for two years. In 1998, he assumed a similar role in West Africa, and in 2000, was named vice president of development for North America. He began work for the Washington, D.C.-based PFC Energy in 2002. Long earned a BBA in economic statistics from OU and an MBA in international finance from the University of Houston. He is a member of the Association of International Petroleum Negotiators and Independent Producers Association of America. He has published research in World Pipelines, forecasting the changes in U.S. natural gas marketing and pipeline activity, and has served as a guest lecturer at OU’s Sarkey Energy Center. OU’s energy management program, one of the premier programs in the Price College of Business, received the Most Innovative Achievement Award by the Southwest Business Deans’ Association. Founded in 1958, the program is the largest among five such programs in the U.S. and Canada. |
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Copyright 2007 The Board of Regents of the University of Oklahoma, All Rights Reserved |
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