IIMA Confluence 2008 Dedicates its Final Day to Look 'Beyond the Frontiers'

IIMA Confluence 2008 Dedicates its Final Day to Look 'Beyond the Frontiers'

Events

The 'Fourth Dimension' exposed the participants to closely approximated business situations. The event involved teams comprising of members belonging to different institutes,

eliminating any advantage resulting from prior knowledge of strengths and weaknesses of fellow team members. The newly formed teams needed to come through as a cohesive unit to be effective as a team. The participants were from both the academic and the business world. There were 56 teams that took part in the competition. The event included market simulation and business optimization strategies. The teams displayed admirable cohesion and group work despite knowing each other for a very short time. The first leg of the event tested the teams on demand forecasting and product pricing. The second leg of the event tested them on making optimum staffing decisions for virtual organizations. Over the two legs the competition was intense and the teams were vying for prize money of Rs. 50,000.

The team comprising Saurabh Gambhir (IIM-A), Srinivas B. (XLRI-Jamshedpur), Kanchanvaja (NRIBM) and Vasim Makda (SLIMS) walked away with the first prize of Rs. 30,000. The second prize was awarded to team comprising Puneet Raheja (IIM-A), Sunny Bhasin (Nestle), Sakshi Goenka (ICFAI Business School) and Vaibhav Dhawan (TISS-Mumbai) who collected prize money of Rs. 20,000.

'TATA Globalisation Challenge' was an invitation only event open to select few B-schools. The event aimed to put the participating teams in the shoes of the industry titans as they look beyond the domestic shores to power the wealth creation engine.

The event was divided into two stages. In the preliminary stage, eight teams were asked to select an acquiring company and a target company. The teams were tested on their ability to strategize and analyse strategic fit, brand fit and intend among other things. Three teams representing IIM Ahmedabad, IIM Lucknow and IIM Indore graduated to the final round where they had to present the financial structure of the deal along with a bid price. This presentation was followed by a brief question and answer session. TATA Group was the official partner for the event.

Sunday morning also witnessed the finals of a strategy game 'BootStrat', conducted in association with Cognizant. The game put the participants in the shoes of business leaders at Cognizant, with a brief to develop the entry strategy for Cognizant Business Consulting into the domain of business and strategy consulting. The event received enthusiastic response with entries pouring in from 33 teams. In the preliminary stage, the reports were evaluated by eminent faculty members from IIM-A and representatives from Cognizant to arrive at the 6 finalists - Team Aspire (NMIMS-Mumbai), D 10 Consulting (IIM-A), DreamZ (IIM-K), Fulcrum (SP Jain IMR), Team Hitchhikers (IIM-A) and Terza Rima (FMS-Delhi). During the finals, the teams were given 15 minutes each to present their analysis and recommendations to the judge, Prof. V. Venkata Rao, faculty member in the Computer & Information Systems area at IIM Ahmedabad. This was followed by a short question and answer session where the teams defended their recommendations in the face of cross questioning by the other teams and the judge.

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* Contributed by -
Ravi Shankar,
IIMA Confluence 2008,
Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad.

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