Over eighty entrepreneurial ideas were submitted to the Saïd Business School Venture Fund in 2008, with four teams winning funding in the final round. More than 200 students, entrepreneurs and business people attended the finalists’ event at the Saïd Business School on 29 May.

The four teams who made it through to the final had up to eighteen minutes to deliver their idea to Sir Philip Green, Mr David Bonderman and Sir Victor Blank. After putting some gruelling questions to the finalists, the panel decided that all four ideas were of a very high standard and recommended that all should receive investment. 

Each team had to include an alumnus or current member of the Saïd Business School and/or a member of student society Oxford Entrepreneurs. The four representatives were:

• Dan Marmar (MBA 2005) with ARK Mobile Finance Ltd. ARK will establish the Gold Standard in credit analytics for M-Banking using innovative behaviour analysis. Customers “qualify” for loans by use of funds. Lending is de-risked and made scalable. M-banking strengthens customer loyalty.
• Hayden Hamilton (MBA 2000) with GreenPrint Technologies, LLC. GreenPrint software revolutionises home and office printing by eliminating common types of wasteful pages.
• Benjamin Carswell (MBA 2005) with MoBank. MoBank is a convenient and trustworthy service allowing customers to make day-to-day transactions and administer their personal finances any time, any place and from any Internet connected device (mobile or fixed).
• Gregory Novak (EMBA 2006) with Project GreenCow and MicroBios Inc. MicroBios, a biotechnology company with research labs in Ithaca, New York, specializes in the research and development of microbial-based technologies that promote human health, animal health, and healthful agricultural production.