MBAs getting punched

OK...no MBAs were punched in the making of this video - I had to rope you in somehow. And most CBS students are out on the town on Saturday night, not blogging away (seriously).

But this was on SNL tonight and it still cracks me up even though I've seen it a bunch of times...

Happy Hour, alumni forever, blogging

Happy Hour last night was a good time. The new J-term was out there in full force and most of them were representing in their cluster t-shirts. Also, all the cluster alumni reps were running around with stickers that said things like 'Cluster X forever' and sticking them all over people. Do they do corny stuff like this at other business schools? :)

Actually, the whole point of the stickers is to raise awareness for the first 'Alumni Forever' week. The school is sponsoring a whole bunch of fun activities including breakfasts, a bowling night, and some other stuff exclusively for 2nd years.

In other news, I was contacted by the woman who leads web communications for CBS. I am going to be doing a blog post on the CBS blog that will show up sometime in the next week or two. I'm probably going to go with a 'back to school' theme but if anyone has some other topics they think would be interesting, let me know soon. Also, I asked her about RSS feeds...they're working on it!

Let the semester's first happy hour begin!

Today is the 1st happy hour of the semester. I just saw a bunch of J-term 2009 Cluster Z'ers wearing their cluster t-shirts. I tell ya, it warms this old man's heart :)

Support student entrepreneurs and pre-register for Intrabid!

This is another note from the guys at Intrabid. Please try out their service - pre-registration is going on now, and its quick and painless (or at least the founders tell me it is...and they're good guys so they're probably telling the truth :)

Here's an abridged version of what they just sent out to me...


As of today, you can pre-register for our service at http://www.intrabid.com/registration.php. Once we are going live, pre-registered users will receive a preliminary password and can immediately start auctioning with fellow students and benefit from our corporate discounts. 


We would really appreciate if you could take a couple of minutes to contribute to our marketing efforts in either or all of the following ways:

-Pre-register at http://www.intrabid.com/registration.php, it really just takes 10 seconds;
-Invite all of your Columbia and NYU friends, and any friends at other universities, to our Facebook page on http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=7664679641

Intrabid

I figured I would give a shotout to the guys who started Intrabid. Holger and Nico are guys who were in my Launching New Ventures class and are launching their company while they are still in school.

The reason I think the company is providing a useful service is that most commerce between students at CBS (selling books, selling furniture, finding someone to sell them an extra Follies ticket, etc) is done via email lists. In this day and age, email is a pretty clunky way to handle it, and Intrabid plans to mediate these interactions through a community-based website.

Here is the blurb they just sent to a bunch of students at school. Check out the site if you have a chance and support CBS entrepreneurship!


Dear fellow students,

Have you ever felt annoyed by all the NOTICES, MARKETPLACE, and REAL ESTATE mails of students wanting to sell furniture, textbooks or any other items that fill up your Columbia mailbox? Or do you want to sell items to your fellow students and see no other opportunity than sending out mails with all the hassle that comes along with it? We developed the solution for you: Intrabid.com – The Community-Based Auction.

For those who don’t know us, Holger and I are second year MBA students at CBS who developed Intrabid.com over the past year. In short, Intrabid is a community-based online marketplace through which college and graduate students can auction products and services amongst their peers on campus and buy new items at exclusive student discounts from established corporate partners. As such, we envision being a one-stop shop for college and graduate students where they can buy and sell any product or service in a secured and closed environment. We obviously expect all of you to be our first users once we officially launch. In the meantime, already check out the Intrabid teaser on http://www.intrabid.com or take a tour of the platform on http://www.intrabid.com/tour_auctions.php.

We plan to launch our pilot at Columbia University and NYU, so please forward this mail and talk about Intrabid to any student you might know outside the business school at Columbia or at NYU. We are counting on your support,

Nico & Holger

Man, I should have hit that Wharton PE/VC conference today...

Looks like there were some protesters who busted in when the cofounder of Carlyle was giving his speech.

I don't think CBS has anyone as controversial coming to its PE/VC conference, unfortunately... (fortunately?)

Deutsche Bank scholarships

Just saw this in my email...

Deutsche Bank just launched The Deutsche Bank MBA Fellows Program at three business schools, including Columbia. It is designed to provide scholarship and employment opportunities to MBA students from underrepresented populations interested in careers in corporate finance or sales & trading. Applicants to Columbia from the class of 2010 are eligible to apply to this program which will provide each winner with a first-year full-tuition scholarship award as well as a guaranteed internship in summer 2009.

You can get the application forms and additional collateral here (courtesy of drop.io).

CBS Launches Blog called "Public Offering"

As a blogger, I am very happy to announce that CBS has finally launched its own blog!

There are a bunch of posts up there now, and I assume more to come. Also, people are already commenting, which I think is a good sign that there will be alot of engagement.

Also, there is a post from fellow J-termer Ryan Petersen, who is working on a school project in Africa as we speak. His personal blog is here.

Pics from Silicon Valley Trek

One of the guys on the trip took a bunch of pictures.  Here is a link if you want to see us posing with various corporate logos :)

Banking or corporate M&A jocks, please stand up

Can any of you point me at favorite investment banking interview question sites, or post some of your favorite i-banking interview questions here?

I am going to be interviewing for a corp M&A role and am trying to get an idea of what questions I'll be asked. Gotta be prepared :)

Thanks in advance for any help you guys and gals can provide.

Update from the Valley (Day 1)

So far so good.

Sunday night we kicked things off with a students-only reception at the hotel we're staying at. We had a mix of 1st years, 2nd years, and EMBAs. Alot of new faces and interesting people. There were some hardcore tech backgrounds and aspirants (tech before school, want to go back to tech companies after school) as well as more traditional consulting/banker types. The Silicon Valley trek has two different tracks - VC/entrepreneurship and consulting/banking.

On Monday we visited Google, Intel, LinkedIn, and VMware. Google was first, and the big selling point for working there seemed to be the food :) They put together a panel of recent MBAs to talk about their jobs, but no one really talked about the day-to-day aspects of their jobs or career path. This is a pattern I have seen with Google and I'm not sure if its because there is no career path and the actual work isn't that exciting, or if it is because they are super-secretive.

Intel was VERY different. Their facilities were very utilitarian, and screamed "established company". No one walking their dog through the buildings or swimming in the outdoor lap pool (both of which I saw at Google). The presentation, however, was quite good. One of the managing directors at Intel Capital presented about her division and discussed her career path. They also talked about their new management rotational program and their finance rotation program. It sounded like most of the slots in the management rotation program were filled but that they might be open to squeezing a few people in if they looked to be star candidates.

LinkedIn came next. They are obviously in startup mode and have the typical startup office setup (open cubicles and free food and drinks in the kitchen). The VP of Marketing gave a great presentation on the company, operating metrics, and where he thinks things are going. Also, the CEO came in and talked to us for a few minutes. As you guys know I believe in LinkedIn as a company and so it was neat to be able to pick their brains and bounce questions off them.

We ended the day at VMware. It was weird to a) pull up to the brand new facility they built and opened after I left and b) to see they had valet parking attendants. Not sure if that's an everyday thing but they definitely didn't have that 3 years ago :) Diane Greene, the CEO, spoke to us and then a panel of MBAs working at VMware answered questions. After that, it was social hour with plenty of great appetizers and beverages. I was quite proud of my alma mater!

Tech Trek Begins in One Hour

First official event of the tech trek is happening in an hour. It's a welcome reception at the hotel we're all staying at. My flight was on Virgin America, and was generally uneventful (other than the awesome 5 hour nap I took).

Tomorrow (Monday) we are hitting the road with the following schedule:

9:00 AM – 10:30 AM: Google
11:30 AM – 1:00 PM: Intel
2:00 PM – 3:30 PM: LinkedIn
4:30 PM – 7 PM: VMWare

I'll try to send some Twitters from the road for those who care to follow along in semi-real time.

You can follow me on Twitter at http://twitter.com/shifter0.

I have no Twitter followers, so make me proud and follow my feed :)

Jetting out to Silicon Valley in a few hours

Time to catch a quick snooze and then off to JFK at 530am. Should be at SFO by noon. Look forward to some updates from the road!

Where are the VC internships in NYC?

I thought it would be useful to any incoming (or current) students of the NYC-based business schools to know which firms currently have interns working part-time during the semester or full time during the summer.

When I started my process, I had to figure out which firms would be good targets by networking and talking to alot of folks, and I think that is definitely an important part of the process. However, I think seeing which firms have interns currently (and when the interns are expected to graduate) may help you in targeting your search.

Here goes...and feel free to add comments if you know of other firms in the area that I missed that have interns now or have done it in the past. Or if you know of an opening.

Another good place to look for VC internships is the PEHub website. They typically have an 'internship roundup' each year where they encourage firms to post.

Chart Venture Partners (one of the partners is a CBS alum and has had multiple CBS interns)
DFJ Gotham (CBS 2008 - also have had CBS interns in past years)
Milestone Venture Partners (CBS 2008 currently interning)
Updata (was seeking an intern as of last semester)
RRE (consistently has had CBS interns over many years)
Contour Ventures(currently have an NYU 2008 intern)
Silicon Alley Venture Partners-Greenhill (have had CBS interns in the past, they were looking for one as of a few weeks ago)
Parkview Ventures (CBS 2008)
Stonehenge (CBS 2008, one of the partners is a CBS alum)
Investor Growth Capital (CBS 2009, formerly had a CBS 2008 intern)