Undergraduate
students from the Eberly College of Business and Information Technology competed
in both rounds of the Association for Corporate Growth (ACG) Cup 2015.
“The ACG Cup
is a case study competition for students, in which participating universities
organize student teams which analyze and present the results of a case study
focusing on mergers and acquisitions to a group of judges consisting of members
of ACG Pittsburgh,” said Mukesh Chaudhry, team advisor and finance and legal
studies professor.
Eberly’s
undergraduate students competed and won the first round of the ACG Cup 2015,
which was held in Eberly on February 24. This was an internal round where Eberly
undergraduate and MBA students competed for a spot in round two.
With this
win, the Eberly students advanced to the final round of the competition held on
March 19 at the Fairmont Hotel in Pittsburgh. The undergrads went head-to-head
with MBA students from Carnegie Mellon University, Duquesne University,
University of Pittsburgh, and West Virginia University.
While their
presentation was “flawless,” according to Chaudhry, MBA students from CMU stole
the win. The MBA students had experience working in the industry as senior
associates in private equity, accounting, and engineering firms and are in the master’s program in Finance.
CMU was awarded a cash prize of $4,000 and the ACG Cup. Eberly and other
runner-ups also received a cash prize of $2,000.
“Hopefully, next time we will have better luck,” said Chaudhry. “I
think we have to take more initiative next time around
and improve our team's performance. One major
benefit of our team's presentation was that many judges congratulated
them and told them that they did not know how young they were as
they showed maturity far beyond their age.”
The ACG Cup
2015 gave Eberly undergraduate students a unique opportunity to put together a
team and apply skills learned in and outside the classroom to a banking case
study. This real world experience helps develop new skills and knowledge by overcoming
challenges.
“By
understanding and accepting, as a group, that each of us had different
strengths and weaknesses we were able to excel as a team and develop beautiful
results,” said Nathan Rosenberg, finance senior. “It was a rigorous week with
little sleep, but a satisfying taste of the real world with an even more
satisfying first round win. We brought our motivation, perseverance, and
attention to detail with us to the second round as well."
Eberly ACG
Cup participants included Nathan Rosenberg, Breanne Loveland, Christopher
O’Brien, Mike Williamson, and their advisor, Mukesh Chaudhry. Alumni Dan Sarver
and Don Haddad were two of the four judges for the internal competition in
round one (pictured above).
—Casey Lemmons
Eberly College of Business and Information Technology