Bull Ring
Jeff Marine Bull Ring Competition, 2024
The Bull Ring serves as a launchpad for new business ideas from CSUN students across campus. At its core, this competition has been created to promote an “action bias” in our students, a concept of experiential learning that involves building assumptions, testing those assumptions in the market, defining product requirements based on validated assumptions, and adjusting requirements dynamically as the first customers emerge. The competition provides direct mentoring as well as workshops covering the fundamentals of launching and growing a new venture. The inaugural event was Spring 2016.
Build your ideas, connect with mentors, and plug into the startup community this Spring! Get access to free workshops, dedicated mentoring and coaching sessions - all designed to guide you through the startup process, from idea to launch. Whether you have a seed of an idea and looking to explore it further, or have already put substantial work into your concept, the competition is a great way to learn more about the entrepreneurial process and receive critical early-stage feedback and advice. All CSUN student-created, -managed, and -owned ventures are welcome.
Now in its 9th year, the Bull Ring has been made possible thanks to the generous support of our founding and continuing donor, Jeff Marine and his family. Please see below for full competition schedule, additional details, and eligibility.
Congratulations to our student teams:
GRAND PRIZE
LS Trust Marketing
Team members: Laci Sanchez & Paris Rayne
LS Trust is a social media production company capitalizing on our existing strengths while expanding our service offerings to meet the evolving needs of our clients in the digital age. With a larger team and an expanded array of services, we aim to become the go-to destination for brands seeking to maximize their online presence and engagement.
2ND PLACE
Rethrifted
Team members: Andrea "Dre" Lopez & Iva Andrade
Rethrifted pioneers affordable clothing with innovative sorting and washing techniques, providing high-quality inventory for online secondhand resellers at uniform prices, regardless of brand or quality.
3RD PLACE
ATLAS
Team members: Evan Jones & William Chavez
ATLAS is developing a mobility solution to help paraplegics and the elderly to access regular non-wheelchair accessible vehicles with a roof mounted wheelchair lift and stowing solution.
AUDIENCE CHOICE
ATLAS
Team members: Evan Jones & William Chavez
ATLAS is developing a mobility solution to help paraplegics and the elderly to access regular non-wheelchair accessible vehicles with a roof mounted wheelchair lift and stowing solution.
SOCIAL IMPACT AWARD
THEELEVENSHOP
Team members: Diamond Evans & Cheyenne Cobb
Theelevenshop is a candle company dedicated to supporting foster youth by providing them with resources and opportunities for a brighter future.
BEST IN TECHNOLOGY AWARD
ReCreate
Team members: Victoria Miteva & Luis Olmos
ReCreate is a social media skill sharing platform designed for anyone seeking creative and productive online engagement. It transforms mindless scrolling into active learning by prioritizing creative content and fostering a safe community for all.
ENTREPRENEURIAL SPIRIT AWARD
Practice & Potential
Team members: Aileen Tang & Nashif Iqbal
Practice & Potential is building a distributed learning platform where scholars can learn math and computer science from highly technical, deeply empathetic instructors in a rigorous, yet compassionate environment.
Prizes
Grand Prize: $10,000
2nd Place: $5,000
3rd Place: $2,500
Additional awards:
Audience Choice: $2,500
Social Impact Award: $2,500
Best Use of Technology: $2,500
$2,500 of free legal services (courtesy of NovusGC) and $2,500 of free marketing/branding services (courtesy of IntersectLA) will also be offered to each of the top 3 teams.
Additional funding available over summer!
Competition Schedule
Sunday, March 3rd
Application Deadline
Friday, March 8th
20 Semi-Finalist Teams Announced
March 11th onward
Coaching & Mentoring Period
Friday, April 5th
5 Finalist Teams Announced
Wednesday, April 24th
Bull Ring Final Event
Application Details
Applications were due Sunday, March 3rd, 2024 and required:
- 10-25 page slide deck *or*
5-7 page executive summary, AND
- a video not to exceed 2 minutes.
The Fine Print: Rules & Eligibility
- The competition is open to ALL current CSUN students.
- The competition is intended for student-created, -managed, and -owned ventures.
- Teams must be comprised of at least 2 members.
- At least 50% of team members must be current CSUN students as of the 2023-2024 academic year (Fall 2023 graduates eligible). The "pitch" must be delivered by a CSUN student.
- Businesses currently earning >$15K in annual revenue are not eligible.
- Business that have already raised >$50K in funding from outside sources are not eligible.
- Both for-profit and non-profit business concepts are eligible; however, sources of revenue must be addressed.
- An individual may only be a member of one team.
- 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place winners from past Bull Ring Competitions are not eligible.
We would like to honor and formally thank the Marine family for their support and generosity in making this competition a reality. Both born and raised in Los Angeles, Joni and Jeff Marine are deeply passionate about elevating the educational opportunities available to children in the greater L.A. area. The family’s philanthropy has also led to the creation of the Alliance Joni and Jeff Marine High School, which opened in 2017 in Sun Valley. The school brings rigorous college-preparatory instruction and powerful learning experiences through interdisciplinary projects and integration of real-world applications. Jeff and Joni have three daughters, Jenna, Jillian, and Jaslin, all three of whom attended the University of Michigan studying Political Science, Art History, Film, and History.
The Bull Ring has been designed to include a 6 week "incubation period" mid-March to late-April for the 20 teams selected as semi-finalists. During this period, each student team is paired with a dedicated mentor to help refine the value proposition, set goals and priorities, and generally, push the venture forward. We would like to thank our distinguished mentors for their support of the competition and the entrepreneurial community at CSUN.
Adel Villalobos
Alan Sugano
Andi Mysza
Avetis Antaplyan
Bandhana Katoch
Cesar Montoya
Danny Stein
Emily Serebryany
Hector Garcia
John Ko
Kevin McVearry
Lewis Dvorkin
Loren West
Michael Letson
Nishit Rathod
Paul Mazbanian
Scott Glassberg
Steven Sarfati
Sylvia Martini
The 8th Annual Jeff Marine Bull Ring New Venture Competition concluded on April 20th, 2023. Please see below for more details:
About CSUN's Center for Social and Technology Entrepreneurship
The Center for Social and Technology Entrepreneurship (C-STE) promotes and fosters entrepreneurship and innovation, with a unique specialization in both technology and social entrepreneurship, within the DNCBE, CSUN, and the greater Los Angeles community by leveraging strengths in networks, research, interdisciplinary initiatives, curricular and co-curricular programming, and community/industry engagement. C-STE also offers a unique specialization at the intersection of technology and social entrepreneurship (socio-tech entrepreneurship) which is a newly emerging and quickly growing area of entrepreneurship that offers exciting opportunities for technology-focused ventures to develop scalable and profitable socially impactful ventures.