Judging Criteria

Judges for the Business Plan Competition will score your Business Concept (this is nothing more than a shortened business plan) based on:

• The research and analysis evident from the concept description.
• The quality of your team's analysis of the strategic elements of your business concept described in Content Criteria below.
• The effectiveness of the team's communication of the business opportunity.
• The extent to which your business opportunity, as presented, is both attractive and realistic.
• For a rough guideline of what is expected from you (and your team if you have one) can be found HERE.

This year an additional component has been added on called “in-depth research.” More information will be available in the future but, generally speaking, what this entails is entrants conducting some market research by asking potential customers what they think of the entrants’ business idea. This is not a technically difficult task and there is a fairly specific formula for doing this task. More information will be available at the Boot Camps and on this website in the near future.

Each business will be evaluated and scored by at least three judges. Judges will be drawn from the Orange County entrepreneurial community, and will include entrepreneurs, investors, and CSUF alumni – all skilled in analyzing business opportunities and evaluating business plans.