Honor Code

All participants and organizers are subject to the Duke University Honor Code, as well as, honor codes and regulations of their individual schools.

Each team must have at least one participating, current Duke student.

The Duke Start-Up Challenge requires that one or more current Duke students have a significant involvement in the development of the work product created for the competition and be a significant owner of the company created and/or recipient of the prize money awarded. As long as this requirement is satisfied, the remaining team members can be drawn from elsewhere. Entries must be the original work of the entrant and may be entered by a single student or a multi-person team. The size of a team is not restricted and neither is the number of entries submitted by a team or individual. However, most teams have 3-5 members with varying skills and interests. Teams are encouraged to seek the involvement of Duke faculty, alumni, post-docs, researchers and staff.

Companies that exist prior to Duke student involvement, who merely recruit a student to become eligible for the competition, are not eligible to compete. The Start-Up Challenge is an educational experience and teams not working towards this end may be disqualified (e.g.teams that have token students to meet eligibility requirements). The Challenge organizers reserve the right to review companies on a case-by-case basis and make final determinations on eligibility accordingly. Teams that are unsure of their eligibility should contact the Organizing Committee.

Submissions should be entrepreneurial and explore the creation of new ideas.

The Duke Start-Up Challenge is fundamentally an entrepreneurship competition and its goal is to encourage Duke students to explore the creation of new businesses. Therefore, the following types of entries are not eligible to participate in the for-profit tracks of the competition: Leveraged Buyouts, Recapitalizations, Restructurings, Privatizations, Roll-Ups, certain Licensing or Franchise arrangements, Joint Ventures, Alliances and Search Funds. Teams that are unsure of the eligibility of their idea should contact the Organizing Committee.

Concepts must be unique to all previous Duke Start-Up Challenge Finalists

Business concepts and/or technologies cannot have formed the basis for a previous year’s Duke Start-Up Challenge Finalist. However, previously submitting business plans that did not advance to the finals of the Duke Start-Up Challenge can re-enter.

Competing businesses/ideas must be in preliminary stages of development

No businesses generating revenues of over $50,000 are allowed to compete.

No businesses/ideas that have received institutional funding can compete (i.e. the team must not have sold equity to anyone outside the team).

Regardless of the purpose, teams that have already secured arrangements for capital from any source (including grants) in excess of $5,000 must disclose the amounts and sources clearly in their entries. Ideas based on academic research must also indicate the sources of support on their competition forms. This information will not be disclosed.

If a team receives funding for its idea during the course of the competition, it must be disclosed as soon as a commitment to make the investment is secured from the investor. Entrants that have generated cash while in the competition in the form of sales revenues or contracts, research grants and personal or family funds are allowed, but must be disclosed. This information will be kept confidential. Ventures that have received outside investment from venture capital firms, private investors or industry sources may be considered ineligible to compete and should contact the Organizing Committee.

THE ORGANIZING COMMITTEE RESERVES THE RIGHT TO DISQUALIFY ANY ENTRY IN ITS’ JUDGEMENT THAT VIOLATES THE LETTER OR THE SPIRIT OF THE COMPETITION GUIDELINES.

Confidentiality is not guaranteed in any way.  Do not include confidential material in your submissions. 

The Duke Start-Up Challenge organization does not take any responsibility for confidentiality; however, the organizers strive to create as safe an environment as possible throughout the competition.

While we do not require judges to sign non-disclosure agreements, these people regularly handle confidential material in the course of their business and understand the need to preserve confidentiality of entered ideas. Furthermore, all of our judges are reputable members of the business community and participate in the program as an educational service, not to steal ideas. We do request that they respect the participants’ rights as a condition of their participation, but the organizing committee will not arbitrate any disputes over judges’ handling of entries. You are free to exclude any material you feel is truly proprietary and at risk of disclosure.

Intra-team confidentiality is the sole responsibility of team members and we will not arbitrate any disputes that arise during the competition.

Teams in the EPC, ESC, and Finals will be required to submit a brief statement of their idea to be used for public relations purposes. The content may be as general or specific as a team desires but, it should be considered public knowledge and will be a required part of participating in these parts of the competition.

DISCLAIMERS

1. The Duke Start-up Challenge competition and its organizers assume no responsibility to ensure the confidentiality of any information disclosed during the competition. The interpretation and enforcement of the foregoing Confidentiality Agreements will be the responsibility of the participants in the competition.
2. Participants in Duke Start-Up Challenge events will have access to confidential information from presenters at the events.
3. Participants who join teams working on technologies owned by Duke University may be asked to sign additional Confidentiality Agreements agreeing to take reasonable care to avoid disclosing confidential information related to their projects.
4. A sample Confidentiality Agreement is provided for inventors and business owners who wish to disclose confidential information to their team members. As mentioned above, the competition and its’ organizers assume no responsibility for the disclosure of confidential information or the enforcement of any Confidentiality Agreement.
5. Teams will present their business plans to judges who will not have signed Confidentiality Agreements. Therefore, any rights held in confidential information, including but not limited to, any intellectual property may be affected by disclosure during the competition. To enter the competition, participants must agree to hold the competition and organizers harmless for any and all rights so affected and waive their rights to any and all claims against the competition and its’ organizers.

Since each patent, mark, trade secret or other piece of intellectual property is unique, customized IP management plans must be developed that take into account, among other things, the source of the technologies and/or inventions used to form the business opportunity, as well the type of intellectual property and its contribution to the work product. However, some basic guidelines are provided here.

Inventions developed by Duke University faculty and staff:

Duke University will generally have an ownership interest in research inventions developed using Duke resources (including University time, funds and/or facilities) as well as in inventions resulting from any research conducted at Duke, subject to the following limitations. Duke University does not have an ownership interest in market research, business model design or other aspects of business planning undertaken by the students as part of the business planning process. Duke University may, however, negotiate with the students to license back any of this content determined to be of value to the relevant technical innovation. In addition, Duke University will not assert an ownership interest in student inventions developed solely for the purposes of entering the Challenge or launching an independent student enterprise, subject to reasonable limitations on the use of University resources.

If the participating team is building its work product around inventions owned by Duke or developed using resources described above, the team members should contact the Office of Licensing & Ventures (OLV) in the process as early as possible. If the inventions have already been disclosed to OLV, then the team members should work with the licensing manager responsible for those invention(s) to confirm that the technology is appropriateness for commercialization and is not the subject of other pre-existing commercialization efforts and to discuss any other relevant intellectual property issues.

In addition, the team members should work closely with the inventors themselves, giving the inventors the opportunity to review and provide input on the work product and business plan. If the inventions have not already been disclosed to OLV, the inventors should prepare disclosures and contact OLV as soon as possible.

If a company is successfully launched under the Duke Start-Up Challenge, the team members may approach OLV with a proposal for licensing the Duke inventions. However, OLV is not obligated to enter into any business relationships with the new company. Per above, however, students may negotiate with OLV for the University to acquire any student work-product (e.g. market research, financial projections, business plan, etc.) for reasonable consideration or an interest in the company.

Inventions developed outside of Duke University:

Ownership of inventions is determined in accordance with applicable patent law, if patentable, or if not patentable, is generally made with the mutual agreement of the relevant parties. Ownership generally follows inventorship. In other words, ownership will depend on who the inventors are and to whom the inventors are obligated to assign their rights (generally employers). The participating team members should contact the inventors and owners of the inventions that are the subject of their work product early in the process, especially, if there are any concerns about the availability of those inventions for commercialization.

Licensing:

OLV is available as a resource to Duke students involved in the Start-Up Challenge. If there are questions about the licensing process, intellectual property protection and/or general questions about commercialization of research-based technologies, please contact OLV. However, OLV will not disclose specific information on any particular licensing deal.

THE PRECEDING REFLECTS POLICY GUIDELINES OF THE DUKE START-UP CHALLENGE AND THE OFFICE OF LICENSING AND VENTURES GENERALLY. IT IS NOT MEANT TO SERVE AS A SUMMARY OR DESCRIPTION OF RELEVANT LAW OR TO SERVE AS A SUBSTITUTE FOR QUALIFIED LEGAL COUNSEL.

If a team wins more than $10,000 from the Duke Start-Up Challenge competition, the team members agree to incorporate or form a business association (e.g. Corp., Inc., LLC, LLP, etc.) with ownership interests divided according to a capitalization table submitted as part of the registration process in the later parts of the competition. Subsequently, the organizing committee will award winnings payable to this specific business entity; after which it is the responsibility of the business to determine how the prize money is utilized. Team members will be required to appoint one of its members to be the Business Association’s official representative (“Representative”). On behalf of the Business Association, and in the absence of a dispute, the Representative will receive any and all monetary prizes awarded to the team resulting from the competition.

Any teams wishing to have individuals compensated directly rather than through an incorporated legal entity will be subject to the approval of the Duke Start-Up Challenge organizing committee and one or more University administrators. To be paid directly, a student must have a taxpayer identification number, and be a citizen or permanent resident of the United States or have the necessary visa status to join the Duke payroll to receive prize money distributions.

Duke University and the Duke Start-Up Challenge will not receive equity stakes in the participating companies simply as a result of award in the competition. Prize money awards do not create an ownership interest in the companies for either Duke University or the Duke Start-Up Challenge. If a company participating in the competition decides to pursue commercial development of intellectual property rights owned by Duke, however, equity may be a part of the terms of the enabling License Agreement (see the ‘Equity’ section of the Rules for further information).

Current Co-Presidents can compete in the Duke Start-Up Challenge, but cannot receive any of the prize money for winning.

Current Members of the Judging Committee cannot compete in the Duke Start-Up Challenge, and must either leave the Judging Committee, or not compete.