Our vision for "Desafio 2009" - Part 1

[Gian Carlo M.]

Since December 2008 our team at GVcepe, with invaluable support from Intel, has been working hard on the development of the 4th edition of the "Desafio Brasil".

The 2008 edition was considered a success, with over 260 applications, 16 teams receiving mentoring from Roland Berger consultants, several interesting presentations and projects. We also had the honor of receiving four Chilean teams who competed amongst themselves for a spot in IBTEC.

We are always imagining new ways of making the competition more relevant for all the people involved (mainly entrepreneurs, investors and scholars) and the presence of the four Chilean teams was the first step towards one of the biggest changes we will be making in 2009: the expansion of the competition to Latin America.

This year we plan on making a Latin American edition of "Desafio". It will actually be structured as the final leg of the local (Brazilian, Chilean, etc.) competitions. We are planning on receiving, in São Paulo, 24 to 48 teams from 4 countries who will compete amongst themselves for the top prizes of the Latin American Competition (1st, 2nd and People's Choice Award) and amongst the competitors from their own country. Sounds confusing? It's not, really!

Imagine the fictional ranking bellow:

In this case, the two "Desafio L.A." winners based on their positions would be "Team X" - in first place - and "Team Y" - in second place. They will be awarded the specific prizes of the "Desafio L.A." competition.

But at the same time the teams compete amongst the competitors of their own country in order to determine the winners of each of the local competition. In this example the 1st and 2nd prize winners of the "Desafio Brasil" (the Brazilian leg of the competition) would be Teams Y and Ω. Those two teams would win the specific prizes of the "Desafio Brasil", including the two spots in IBTEC available for Brazilian teams.

It's not so complicated after all, is it? We hope it will be a great success and that in 2010 the competition will be hosted in another country.

I'll write a second post soon explaining some of the other changes that will happen to "Desafio Brasil" and "Desafio América Latina". Please feel free to comment and critique our vision for "Desafio América Latina"! We would love your feedback.

Check-out the second post of the series!