Release Date: Friday, February 22, 2002

STUDENTS FROM NATION'S TOP-RANKED BUSINESS SCHOOLS ARRIVE February 23 FOR GM/TERRY MARKET RESEARCH PROJECT COMPETITION

ATLANTA, Ga. — Graduate students from the nation's best business schools will converge on the UGA Alumni Club and Business Center in Buckhead February 23 to take part in the first annual GM/Terry Market Research Project Competition, where at day's end the team with the best solution to a real world marketing problem will take home a $10,000 grand prize.

The 11 competing teams have had 10 weeks to prepare a 20-minute presentation based on one of three cases. Following their presentation, each four-student team will then be subjected to a 10-minute question-and-answer period by the contest's panel of judges, said event organizer Rajiv Grover, head of the Marketing Department at the University of Georgia's Terry College of Business.

Each of the cases addresses General Motors' real world marketing strategies, and company officials will be on hand to hear what insights and innovations the students may suggest. At the end of the contest, the presentations become intellectual property of GM.

Among the competition's panel of judges are General Motors executives, including Katherine J. Benoit, executive director of eCommerce for GM's North American Operations; Keith Denny, business analyst for eGM; and Tyrone Jordan, director of New Business Development and Diversity Affairs, The Americas Operations, eGM. Also on the judging panel is Lee Copeland, senior editor of Computerworld magazine.

Grover approached GM about putting a different spin on the contest last year, capitalizing on the strong reputation of the school's Marketing Department.

Grover said GM was particularly interested in the concept he proposed for the competition, which is less tightly scripted than the many other "case" competitions conducted by U.S. business schools

In other more traditional marketing competitions, which normally last only a day, teams are asked to provide an answer to a problem that is thoroughly described, with details usually drawn from a situation experienced by a company in the past. In contrast, the GM/Terry competition gives the teams only a general description of the situation, putting the onus on them for both framing and solving the problem, he said.

"It's very, very unstructured - more like a real world situation," said Grover. "Determining the nature of the problem is the biggest part of solving it."

Just as it might for real world consultants, GM is picking up the tab for each team's travel and hotel expenses, as well as the costs of their research and presentations up to $3,000. There was no open registration; each team accepted an invitation from GM to come to the competition, which the company will also use to scout new executive talent.

Business schools who accepted invitations to send teams to the event include Carnegie Mellon University, Emory University (Goizueta), Harvard University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Sloan), Northwestern University (Kellogg), Stanford University, University of Georgia (Terry), University of Michigan, University of North Carolina (Kenan-Flagler), University of South Carolina (Moore), and Vanderbilt University (Owen).

Four of the top five business schools ranked by U.S. News and World Report are competing, and 10 of the schools — including Terry — are ranked in the top 50 by both U.S. News and Business Week.

"The contest is an opportunity for GM to see these students in action solving real problems GM is going to face in the future," Grover said. "GM is very, very interested in knowing what these students think."

In addition to the $10,000 grand prize, the second and third place teams will win $5,000 and $1,000 cash prizes, respectively.

For more information on the GM/Terry Market Research Project Competition, including an event schedule, contact numbers and directions, visit the competition's Web site at http://www.terry.uga.edu/gmmr/ or call 706-542-3776.

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