About

Overview
1000 Pitches is an annual entrepreneurial competition at the University of Michigan hosted by MPowered Entrepreneurship, a student-run organization. The competition is held during the Fall term and is aimed at generating innovative business and product ideas from the U-M students that fit into ten categories. The student with the best pitch in each category is awarded $1000. The theme this year is “My Passion, My Pitch.” and will connect with different students’ passions and inspire them to act upon their ideas.

Mission
The 1000 Pitches Competition serves four primary purposes:               

  1. To stimulate entrepreneurial thinking and creative problem solving at the University of Michigan                   
  2. To showcase the University of Michigan’s entrepreneurial talent and spirit
  3. To empower U-M students to pursue entrepreneurial achievements
  4. To ultimately spur economic growth and social change in Michigan, the nation, and the world

Story
You don’t have to be an engineer or a businessman to be an entrepreneur; all it takes is the willingness to stand in front of a camera and explain your idea.

Who hasn’t woke up in the middle of the night and thought – I wish this existed.  What do you wish was different about the university?  What business would you like to open?

What started as a simple initiative to promote entrepreneurship at U-M quickly evolved into the one of the largest entrepreneurship competitions ever held on a college campus.  1000 Pitches sought out students from all over campus to pitch entrepreneurial ideas in one of seven categories for a chance to win $1000.

The simplicity of the entry helped the competition transcend all different colleges and student groups, making this a truly campus-wide endeavor.

In working on 1000 Pitches, it was inspiring to see how alive creativity and innovation are at Michigan.  The sheer excitement visible in the face of a student explaining his or her idea was enough to remind us all why we champion entrepreneurship so much – but just in case once wasn’t enough, we got over 1000 reminders.         

Milestones
           
●   Last year, during the third year of the competition, we tripled the number of pitches that we attained during the competition’s first year, collecting 3031 pitches.
           
●   We rewarded over $14,000 in prize money to category winners and organizations participating in the Pledge Program.

Sponsors