Lundquist College of Business juniors Alex Summers, Josh Bryant, Xiao Liang, and Matt Miller recently competed in KPMG's Business Consulting Case Competition placing first in the region.

The competition was stiff against student teams from West Coast colleges and universities, but the group earned the top spot and will be traveling to New York City for the national competition February 25–26. The winners of that competition, the U.S. champions, will then head to Dubai, United Arab Emirates, to compete against more than 20 countries at the International Competition in April.

The Lundquist College team is the first group from the University of Oregon to be selected to compete at nationals. This is a separate competition than the KPMG Financial Accounting Case Competition, in which Lundquist students have also excelled.

This case concerned an airline company operating in the Europe, Middle East, and Africa market with certain factors affecting the industry. For the competition, the team had to choose which factor would help the company establish a sustainable competitive advantage.

The Lundquist students specifically addressed capacity utilization, salaries, and benefits/employee relations.

All four students are also members of the Business Honors Program, the Oregon Consulting Group, and the University of Oregon Investment Group.

They say their activities at the college gave them a strong foundation for the competition, and they are looking forward to the national competition.