---

News Release

Last modified: Thursday, April 19, 2007

IU Kelley School of Business gets Big Ten bragging rights after case competition

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
April 19, 2007

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. -- A team of first-year Master of Business Administration students at Indiana University's Kelley School of Business won first-place team honors in the 2007 Big Ten MBA Case Competition this past weekend (April 13-14), and one of its members took individual honors.

Keith Gelarden Dayton, senior faculty lecturer and MBA Core coordinator, coached the IU team, which consisted of Abhi Nadgir, Bhavin Shah, John Donald Walter and Manish Mathur. Nadgir also was the individual winner in the category of best final-round presenter.

The Kelley School previously won the Big Ten MBA Case Competition in 2000 and 2003.

Hosted annually by The Ohio State University Fisher College of Business, the event is designed to give first-year MBA students the opportunity to test their knowledge. Teams from each school analyze a complex business case, identify the challenges represented and present recommendations. The winning team enjoys "Big Ten bragging rights" and an invitation to represent the conference in the Big Ten/PAC 10 Rose Bowl Challenge next year.

This was the 15th anniversary of the competition, and ten of the 11 schools in the Big Ten conference sent teams. Judging was conducted by a panel of business professionals from Scotts Miracle-Gro, Booz Allen Hamilton, Crane Plastics, the Voice and Data Services division of Discover Financial Services and Fifth Third Bank. The judges also prepared the case, which centered around the Scotts Company, and conducted debriefing sessions with all of the competing teams.

According to Dayton, the IU coach, the foundation of the Kelley MBA Case Competition team success was the breadth and depth of individual team members. He said that those attibutes reflect the instruction and coaching Kelley MBA students get in their first year through the integrated core curriculum, strategy training and the industry-focused academies.

"I was pleased at the depth to which our students were prepared to take on this case" Dayton said. "This competition is incredibly competitive and that reflects well on the Big Ten schools as a whole."

---

---