Fear not, the east coast is not the only part of the country with a startup competition. Small Business BC is hosting their own business plan competition.
There are separate categories for startups and for more mature growth businesses. Each category is up for a $40,000 prize (we think, it’s not clear).
This contest seems pretty well run, and is much more open in terms of the types of businesses that can apply, but it also seems to have a much less attractive prize package. There may be ancillary prizes we just aren’t aware of yet however.
They are also very prescriptive of how your business plan should look which doesn’t nessecarily mean that they will find the best startups, or the best entrepreneurs, instead they may just find the best darn bunch of business plan writers in BC.
Business Plans aren’t always where you should be spending your time, instead I think that a competition like this should leave the criteria much more open and should simply judge each entrepreneur and business based on how well the idea is presented.
Only a few tech startups have won in the past.