The Al Gore Sustainable Technology Venture Competition™

The Al Gore Sustainable Technology Venture Competition™

The Al Gore Sustainable Technology Venture Competition™ Asia's first and most prestigious sustainable/clean technology business plan competition, founded in 2007, is the brainchild of Oopali Operajita, CEO, Cicero, A Trans National Advisory, a Senior Political and International Affairs Adviser to several of India’s prominent political leaders and a former Distinguished Faculty Fellow at Carnegie Mellon University, USA. Operajita thought up an exclusive All India Sustainable Technology Venture Competition in honour of Vice President and Nobel laureate Al Gore. She named it for Al Gore, with encouragement from some of Gore’s colleagues from his White House days, and launched the First Al Gore Sustainable Technology Venture Competition in November 2007. Finalists were invited to make live presentations before an eminent judging panel on February 11-12, 2008, in New Delhi. The impetus and motivating force lay in Operajita’s wish to galvanize an entire generation of India’s formidable engineering, science, technology and management students — widely acknowledged as some of the brightest in the world — from its leading institutions, such as its legendary Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs), National Institutes of Technology (NITs) and Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs), as she says, “into thinking sustainability, and incorporating it into their mindsets, and coming up with sustainable technology solutions, for the future of the imperilled planet.” Further, she states, “Indians are known as some of the world’s greatest innovators and entrepreneurs, and I wanted to tap into this incredibly rich resource pool with one stroke.” The institution Operajita selected to tie up with, in the first year, was the Indian Institute of Foreign Trade (IIFT), New Delhi.


ASSOCHAM and IIT Kharagpur are Official Partners of The Al Gore Sustainable Technology Venture Competition, November 6-7, 2009 at IIT Kharagpur, West Bengal, India.

Mercedes-Benz India is Official Sponsor.


The competition is scheduled for November 6-7, 2009, at IIT Kharagpur, India.

Click here for Rules for the Competition. For a Sample Business Plan Format click here.

Deadline for electronic submission of business plans: September 30, 2009.

Cash Prizes of Rs. 1,00,000 and Rs. 70,000 will be awarded to the winners and runners up.

Click here to download the poster for the current competition. Download IIT Kharagpur's poster here.

For further information, please contact: joysen (at) arp (dot) iitkgp (dot) ernet (dot) in or agstvc (at) gmail (dot) com