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Home team takes bronze at JMUCC 

The delegation of four JMSB undergraduates came out in third place at the end of the second annual John Molson Undergraduate Case Competition, a contest organized by students and described by observers as ‘flawlessly organized.’

Held March 21 to 27, the competition crowned Victoria, B.C.’s Royal Roads University as champs, followed by HEC from the Université de Montréal in second place.

JMSB undergrads Meaghen Annett, Rocco Masella, Amanda Paquin and Marion Roussel represented the home delegation. JMSB alum Malaz Sebai (MBA 09) and Christian Bonneau (BComm 07) helped coach the squad. Both coaches brought the experience earned when they represented the JMSB in past case competitions.

“This was an amazing competition that required two skills sets; the round robin was a set of sprints, and the long prep was a marathon. We proved ourselves in both,” said a weary JMSB Commerce Games Advisor Mark Haber early Monday morning.

“The bottom line is that we really represented ourselves well,” he said.

Adding to the third place honour, Masella earned a best presenter award, and the JMSB’s Johnnie Vu won the hospitality award as ambassador to Singapore Management University. (Not formally part of the competing process, each participating team is designated a JMSB student as an ambassador to ensure day-to-day tasks are taken care of.)

Undergraduate business students from 20 business schools from all over the world gathered at the new MB Building to take part in one of the most prestigious international undergraduate competitions. The number of attending teams matched the record set at last year’s competition.

Among attendees this year were Purdue University, Queen's University, University of British Columbia, and University of South Carolina, as well as international universities Chulalongkorn University in Thailand, Dublin Institute of Technology in Ireland, Singapore Management University, Corvinus University of Budapest as well as Hong Kong University of Science and Technology.

At six days long, the JMUCC is one of the longest competitions for undergraduate business students. Again this year, the lengthy contest required the help of numerous sponsors including the Montreal Alouettes, VIA Rail, TD Meloche Monnex, La Senza, Saputo, Molson Canada and Bombardier.

The Undergraduate National Case Competition began in 2002, holding the event each year except 2006. Last year, organizers decided to rebrand the contest (see Journal, March 5, 2009) with a new look and logo to build on the JMSB’s growing international reputation. This year’s event was successful thanks to the efforts of organizers: José Garcia, Marian Rossi, Matthew Parker James, Megan Bouchard and Andrei Sabau.