1st Annual Pacific Northwest Case Competition

*On April 22 – 23rd, Foster School of Business hosted the 1st annual Pacific Northwest Case Competition. Participating schools included: Gonzaga University, Seattle University, University of British Columbia, University of Washington Bothell, University of Washington Seattle, University of Washington Tacoma.

The UW Seattle Team celebrates being done

Walking across the stone mezzanine in Paccar Hall and passing the numerous team rooms equipped with ceiling-to-floor windows and flat screen TV’s, it is easy to imagine how this building was designed with the intention of hosting case competitions. This April, the Foster School’s Strategy Club brought that goal to fruition with the 1st Annual Pacific Northwest Case Competition. Bolstered by the sponsorship of Starbucks Coffee Company and Adobe System Inc., the Strategy Club and the Foster School of Business welcomed teams from across the Pacific Northwest to our school. These teams competed by building and presenting strategic plans for the future of a struggling CPG company.

Case competitions are excellent opportunities to practice working as a team under tight deadlines and presenting to business professionals. For those of us involved in organizing the event this weekend represented an end to several months of meticulous planning and we were enormously pleased by how well it was received by the participants, judges and sponsors. The competition culminated in an intense final round with the winning team inching out the runners-up for the final prize of $2000. All said, this was a memorable battle of the brains between students from the premier NW business schools and we are all looking forward to doing it again next year.