RIT’s MBA Students Place Second in Prestigious Competition in Syracuse

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A. Sue Weisler

E. Philip Saunders College of Business

The “final four” from Rochester Institute of Technology’s E. Philip Saunders College of Business came in second at the Whitman Business Case Competition, hosted by the Whitman School of Management at Syracuse University.

Out of 18 participating teams from upstate New York universities, six teams (three from RIT) were invited to give their final presentation at the Whitman Business School on April 9.

RIT finished second to Cornell. But the winning RIT student team—Narendra Bosukonda (MBA, entrepreneurship), Deepti Uppala (M.S. Finance), Kandarp Raval (MBA, operations management) and Pallavi Srivatsava (M.S. Finance)—considered the competition a terrific learning experience.

According to Bosukonda, the RIT team made their 20 minute presentation, followed by a question and answer section that was limited to 10 minutes, but lasted around 25.

“While we discussed our case from various perspectives—marketing, financial analysis, strategy and strategy implementation—the Cornell team went for an in-depth financial analysis where they did a Monte Carlo simulation. The judges told us that they had a split decision and we lost narrowly.

“We owe this victory to our RIT professors—Patricia Wollan, Richard DeMartino, Rich Notargiacamo, Robert Boehner and Christopher Young—who taught us valuable tools in analyzing and solving real business problems.”

Note: Rochester Institute of Technology’s executive MBA program, offered by the E. Philip Saunders College of Business, is a 15-month degree program and is designed for experienced mid-level professionals who are seeking to advance their careers. For further information, visit Saunders College of Business website.