Call For Applications: Blue Ocean Student Entrepreneur Competition 2025 (Up To $1000 Cash Prize)

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The Blue Ocean Student Entrepreneur Corporation Competition is a virtual competition that attracts the very best high school-aged entrepreneurs from all over the world.

Every year, thousands of high school students pitch their innovative business concepts to experienced entrepreneurs and business people, receive feedback on their ideas, join a community of like-minded students, and compete for thousands in cash prizes.

Blue Ocean Student Entrepreneur Competition Award Information

1st Place: $1000
2nd Place: $750
3rd Place: $500
People’s Choice: $750 (top pitch with the most likes on Youtube)

Prizes for regional winners

North America – $500
Europe – $500
Africa – $500
Asia and Oceania – $500
Latin America – $500
Middle East – $500
Certificates for all winners.
Certificate of Participation is awarded to all participants who submit their pitch.
Certificate of Outstanding Achievement is awarded to Top 10 pitches.

2025 Awards for participating Schools

$1,000 to the school that has the most individual or team pitches that make the Top 25
$1,000 to the top 5 schools who bring in the most submissions
Certificate of Outstanding Achievement is awarded to select Blue Ocean Teacher Champions
Certificate of Recognition is awarded to select schools for supporting student entrepreneurship and innovation

About Blue Ocean Student Entrepreneur Competition

Students learn the methodology to maximize opportunities and minimize risks to drastically decrease the odds of failure for their entrepreneurial ideas.
Students pursue both differentiation and low cost to formulate blue ocean business ideas.
High school’s students can all compete, wherever they may be in the world.
High school students with just an idea for a blue ocean business can also participate.
Blue Ocean tools and templates are provided to build your business idea and to structure your pitch.
Students are recognized for their participation and outstanding achievement and also for Blue Ocean online course completion.
Students and teachers have an opportunity to win prizes for their school. Resources are provided for teachers to teach the college-level course materials in their class.

Blue Ocean Student Entrepreneur Competition Benefits

Get real entrepreneurial experience. This is a practical exercise in entrepreneurship.
Make your college applications stand out by participating in a world-class global competition.
Learn about blue ocean strategy – often required reading in college
Gain valuable experience developing and pitching blue ocean business ideas.
Develop essential skills in communicating ideas, developing a pitch, working in a team or by yourself, and more.
Get feedback from seasoned entrepreneurs and business executives.
Win money for yourself. Win prizes for your school. No constraints on spending.
Have fun challenging and beating high school students from all around the world!

Who can Compete?

Any high school student from around the world can compete in this virtual competition.

Competition Rules

All participants in the competition must be of high school age (14-18 years old at time or registration).
Participants can compete individually or as part of a team (maximum 5 students per team). A team can be formed with students from the same high school or from different high schools.
All participants must register for the competition. If you’re working with a team, all team members must register for the competition.
The participants must complete the online Blue Ocean Mini-Course before submitting their pitch.
All pitches must be original and not copied from somewhere else.
All pitches must be in English.
Pitches should be video files and must be under 5 minutes in length. The files must be under 1 GB.
Upload your blue ocean pitch to YouTube with the hashtag #blueoceancompetition and include a link to the published video when submitting your entry on the pitch submission form.
Pitches received after the submission deadline (Feb 16, 2025, midnight) will not be accepted.
Top 100 pitches will be added to the YouTube channel once they are submitted.
Pitches must not violate laws or trademarks.
Blue Ocean Competition reserves the right to eliminate any pitch and/or disqualify any individual or team that it deems inappropriate or harmful to another team or the competition itself.
No derogatory comments should be made on other pitches once they are up on YouTube.
While there is no set format for pitches (voice-over animation or graphics or talking heads), they encourage you to use the templates provided to structure your pitch for increasing your chances of winning.
Use of Blue Ocean tools to describe your business idea is mandatory. Use the Strategy Canvas to describe the industry landscape, the Three Tiers of NonCustomers to describe your target market and the Eliminate-Reduce-Raise-Create Grid to describe your strategy.
Each pitch will be evaluated by multiple judges who will watch randomly assigned pitches. They will combine the scores and then rank all pitches. The top pitches in each round will move to the next round. You only submit once.
They start by choosing the Top 100 pitches. They then narrow the list down to the Top 25, then the Top 10 and then announce the winners.
Each round is approximately 1-2 weeks. So, once they announce winners from one round, it will take them one-two weeks to narrow the list again.
Once they get to the Top 25 Pitches, they will provide feedback on your pitch from the judges in that round.
The People’s Choice Award is chosen by a combination of YouTube likes and the own Judge likes. To be eligible, the pitch must be included in the Top 100 as chosen by the judges. You can have your friends and schoolmates “like” your video.
If you’re working with a team, submit only 1 video entry per team. You will be asked to enter your team members’ names on the pitch submission form.
Violation of any rule will result in disqualification.