About Mesa Venture League Mesa Venture League (MVL) is a national inter-college entrepreneurship championship by Mesa School of Business, designed to bring together some of the most entrepreneurial undergraduate students in India. After an online selection process, the top 30 Entrepreneurship Cells from colleges across India will gather at the Mesa campus in Bengaluru for a 3-day national competition. Over the 3 days, student teams will compete across five challenges, culminating in the Mesa Venture League Grand Finale. The five challenges are designed to test different dimensions of entrepreneurship, including venture building, AI-powered product creation, solving real startup problems, brand building, and selling under pressure:
Venture Pitch-Off: Teams pitch an original startup idea live to a jury at Mesa.
AI Hackathon: Teams receive a problem at the finals and have one day to build a functional AI-powered product.
Founder for a Day: Teams solve a real growth challenge from an operating startup & present their solution to its leadership.
Brandverse: Teams take a product or business brief and build its positioning, brand and go-to-market approach.
Sell or Sink: Teams are given a product and a set of constraints, and must figure out how to sell it in the real world. The competition is designed to test not just how well students can pitch an idea, but how they think, build, sell and make decisions when put in the founder’s seat. Eligibility Each college may submit only one MVL registration through its E-Cell or equivalent entrepreneurship body. Colleges participate in MVL through their E-Cells, individual students cannot register independently. Students who want to participate should apply through their college’s E-Cell or equivalent entrepreneurship body. Competing students must be enrolled in an undergraduate programme at the college they represent. The E-Cell must be able to field teams across all five founder challenges and attend the full National Finals from 22 to 24 January 2027. Participant overlap rules will be set out in the official rulebook. Why Participate? 1) Bring the national title back to your college: The E-Cell with the highest cumulative score across all five challenges will be crowned Mesa Venture League Champion 2027. 2) Compete for ₹15 lakh in cash prizes: The prize pool will recognise the MVL Champion and the highest-performing challenge teams. The final allocation will be published in the official rulebook. 3)
Present to active investors: Selected teams will receive direct feedback from VCs and angel investors, with the possibility of follow-on conversations. 4) Experience
Bengaluru’s startup ecosystem: Spend three days at Mesa meeting founders, operators and investors while competing at the centre of India’s startup economy. 5) Work with experienced startup operators: MVL brings student teams face to face with people who have built and backed successful startups. Their questions and feedback will test your thinking at a level only few college competitions can offer. 6) Fast-track your route to
Venue
Mesa School of Business
Bangalore, India
PGP Forge: High-performing MVL participants can earn a fast-track route through admissions to PGP Forge, Mesa’s one-year venture-building programme for recent graduates, subject to programme eligibility. The National Finals (22nd - 24th January, 2027) Friday, 22 January | Opening and
Challenge launches: Delegation registration, competition briefing and the opening rounds of the founder challenges. Saturday, 23 January | Competition and
Founder Engagement: Challenge work, live judging, mentoring and sessions with founders and operators from Bengaluru's startup ecosystem. Sunday, 24 January | Grand
Finale and Awards: Final demonstrations, the live Shark pitch, announcement of challenge results and the presentation of the MVL Championship. About Mesa School Of Business Mesa School of Business is a Bengaluru-based new age business school focused on startups and entrepreneurship. Mesa believes that business is best learnt by doing. Students build ventures, launch products, sell, solve live startup problems and learn directly from founders, operators and investors. Mesa Venture League extends this philosophy beyond the
Mesa campus: creating a national platform where ambitious undergraduate students can build, compete and prove what they are capable of before they graduate.