The winning team from the College’s level of the Johnson & Johnson University Case Competition moved on to compete at the national level on March 14 and 15 at Johnson & Johnson’s corporate headquarters in New Brunswick, N.J. Florida International University was announced as the competition’s winning team.
“We did not win the competition but it was a great experience,” said sophomore economics major Davis Craig. Craig was the captain of team Juke and Jab, who represented the College at the corporate level.
Team Juke and Jab was awarded $2,000 from Johnson & Johnson for winning at the College level. The money is awarded to the business school and the team will decide how they would like it to be allocated.
This is the first year the College has participated in the case competition. The company only asks 10 colleges in the nation to compete.
“We competed against schools like Rutgers, Penn State and Florida University. All of these schools have been competing in the competition for many years and were accompanied by an academic adviser,” Craig said.
At the competition, the team was able to learn from their competitors and get a sense of what the judges are looking for at the national level of a business case competition.
Johnson & Johnson asks students to put together a small team and become the decision makers in a hypothetical pharmaceutical company similar to Johnson & Johnson. The team must decide how to produce and finance a drug that would be used for patients with late stages of prostate cancer.
Johnson & Johnson hoped that, in addition to providing students with a positive experience in making business related decisions, the competition would also raise awareness about the dangers of prostate cancer. The company hopes to reach out to communities and get in touch with consumers directly.
“Cancer is one of J&J’s biggest areas,” said Richard Minevich, senior financial analyst at Janssen Pharmaceuticals, Inc. “One in six men are diagnosed with prostate cancer.”
Johnson & Johnson feels the competition went very well and is looking forward to bringing it back to the College for years to come, according to Minevich.
