$250,000 Breakthru Business Plan Competition Launched

FREDERICTON (NB) – The New Brunswick Innovation Foundation (NBIF) is once again on the search for the province's next great entrepreneur. Breakthru – New Brunswick's Business Plan Competition launches today with over $250,000 in investments and professional services for the top three business plans.




The Grand Prize will be a $100,000 cash investment plus professional services from the competition’s corporate partners including legal services by presenting sponsor Cox & Palmer.Two second prizes will be awarded as well, each for a $50,000 cash investment plus additional services.

“Creating new innovative companies is exactly what New Brunswick needs in order to grow, and we have got to do whatever it takes to tap into the province’s most talented people,” says Calvin Milbury, President and CEO of NBIF, “innovative people need to know that they can turn their ideas into reality, and learn the process for raising the capital they need to do it—Breakthru does exactly that.”



To get started, participants are required to submit an application, executive summary and elevator pitch to the Foundation by January 10, 2011. Entries that meet the criteria for the competition will subsequently attend the Breakthru Boot Camp facilitated by Shad Valley President and Harvard Business School graduate Barry Bisson, and sponsored by the New Brunswick Securities Commission.

“The Breakthru Boot Camp is one of the most important parts of the competition, taking participants through everything from developing your pitch to building the financial model that is needed to be seriously considered by investors,” Milbury says, “even if they don’t move ahead in the competition, with more work, they can still apply for an investment from our longstanding Venture Capital Fund, as one of our regular clients.”



After the boot camp, participants have three weeks to deliver their formal business plan. From those, six finalists will be chosen to pitch to the Breakthru Selection Committee on March 16, 2011, with the prizes to be awarded at the Breakthru Awards Dinner later that day.

“The legal work that some start up companies need before they get off the ground can bear heavily on the mind of the most seasoned businessperson,” says Peter Forestell, Q.C., Managing Partner at Cox & Palmer's Saint John office, “we understand this, and our goal is to do what we can to help new entrepreneurs get established, and become their trusted advisor along the way.”



Cox & Palmer has been a sponsor of Breakthru since its inception in 2007.