AND THE MYSTERY CHALLENGE IS...

Today, one of the world’s most pressing problems is the global recession, which has had a devastating effect on individuals, communities, companies, and entire countries. Those who have been least affected know how to build financial reserves to draw upon and/or how to do more with less. However, many people around the world view these as difficult or unpleasant to do. Let's do something to change that!

Your challenge is to... MAKE SAVING MONEY FUN!

Create as much value and have as much impact as possible while making it fun to save money.

- Remember that "saving" can be defined in lots of different ways.   

- Impact comes in many different forms:  financial, educational, artistic, humor, awareness, behavior changing, relationship building, peacemaking, etc. 

- And, of course, there are LOTS of ways to have fun!!

We encourage you to come up with products, services, experiences, or anything else you can imagine... Feel free to act locally or globally, and to think small or BIG. 

You must actually implement your ideas and deliver results.

Entrepreneurship is all about leveraging resources and taking action with the goal of creating value. 

The 2009 Global Innovation Tournament (GIT) is a fast-paced competition that will challenge student teams to solve a mystery challenge in about eight days, creating as much value and impact as possible. Teams must then convey their results in a short video posted to YouTube. The mystery problem will be revealed on November 4 (GMT-8) and submissions will be due Nov 13 (GMT-8).  In the past, the assignments involved common, everyday objects. This year it’s a global problem.  What will it be?

Local organizers conduct the tournament locally, select their respective local winners, and submit them to Stanford for global judging. Global winners are featured online on the Global Entrepreneurship Week website and receive a certificate of recognition from Stanford. Any student can register to participate.

GIT is conducted by the Stanford Technology Ventures Program, which is part of the department of Management, Science & Engineering in the School of Engineering at Stanford University.

GIT is an official activity of Global Entrepreneurship Week.

Any student worldwide is invited to participate in the tournament:	Any educational organization worldwide is invited to organize a local competition: