The entrepreneurship program at the Robert H. Smith School of Business is ranked among the top 13 nationally in the April 2005 issue of Entrepreneur magazine. For the third consecutive year and since the surveys inception, the magazine has included the Smith School prominently among its annual list of the best 100 collegiate entrepreneurship programs in the United States.

College Park - February 14, 2005 The Dingman Center for Entrepreneurship at the Robert H. Smith School of Business, University of Maryland announced today that it has invested $10,000 in start-up funding to Hook & Ladder Brewery, a student-run business founded by second-year Smith MBA student Matthew Fleischer. The investment is part of the seed stage funding the center makes available to student-run, start-up companies.

Nearly 20 years after the launch of the Dingman Center for Entrepreneurship at the University of Maryland, a new strategy launches to foster the entrepreneurial spirit in the Smith community. Pitch Dingman builds on the Dingman business development process of Ideation, Assessment, Implementation, and Iteration by creating a regular forum where aspiring entrepreneurs can pitch their business ideas to a panel of experienced scholars.

The Dingman Center for Entrepreneurship at the Robert H. Smith School of Business, University of Maryland, has won the 2003 national Outstanding Entrepreneurship Course of the Year award from the United States Association for Small Business and Entrepreneurship (USASBE) for its groundbreaking course in which MBA students work with the $20-million New Markets Growth Fund (NMGF). The course, New Markets Growth Fund Practicum, was unanimously selected as the winner at the 18th Annual USASBE Annual Conference in Dallas on Jan. 18, 2004.

A team of five talented Smith School MBA students won second place at the fourth annual Venture Capital Investment Competition (VCIC ). The competition was held at the Kenan-Flagler Business School, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill (March 29-31, 2001).