Cent$ible 2026.

Élan's business flagship, in collaboration with Sanjay Ghodawat International School. An inter-school business arena for students aged 14 to 20 where you compete, collaborate, and build the business leaders of tomorrow. Crisis Command and Cent$ible run at the same time, so you take part in one.

₹10,000

Cash prize for the winning Cent$ible team in the Boardroom Finale, awarded at the Grand Closing and Awards Ceremony alongside certificates, trophies and individual special recognitions.

Compete. Collaborate.
Create the business
leaders of tomorrow.

Cent$ible is a live inter-school business arena. Across two competitive themes, teams build brands and trade markets, and the best teams advance to the Boardroom Finale.

One arena, two themes, one champion.

Cent$ible is built around two business themes. Each one is its own competition with several rounds, and the strongest teams from every theme go through to the Boardroom Finale to fight for the overall championship.

Format

Team-based

You compete in teams in the theme you choose. Between the rounds there are networking sessions and interactive activities.

Eligibility

Ages 14 to 20

Open to school students aged 14 to 20, across schools and delegations. First-year university students within the same age range are also eligible and can register individually.

Currency

Cents

A shared in-event currency. Teams earn it, invest it, and bid with it as the rounds play out.

The finale

Boardroom Finale

The top teams from each theme meet in the finale to decide the overall champion.

BRAND बनाओ.

Build, adapt, pitch, and dominate. BRAND बनाओ is where you create a real startup and pitch it under pressure, with your idea evolving across three rounds the way it draws on Shark Tank, a startup expo, and live business decisions.

Before the event

Your Product Brief

Two days before Élan, every team submits a short product information form: brand name, product or service, target customer, price range, business model, sales channel, key differentiator, one major dependency and your expansion idea. This is what the organising team uses to build a crisis tailored to your startup. You will not be told what that crisis is.

Round 1

The Founder Pitch

A five-minute pitch, delivered as founders speaking to investors. Cover your brand name and what it means, your logo and the thinking behind it, your target audience, your business model and how you make money, your marketing strategy, and your future vision. Judges may stop you at five minutes, so rehearse to the clock.

Round 2

Brand Under Pressure

After lunch you receive a sealed envelope containing a crisis built specifically for your startup. You get twenty minutes to analyse it and rebuild your strategy, then three minutes to present your recovery plan: what happened, what you do first, what changes, how you protect customer trust, and how you prevent it happening again. The top three teams go through to the Boardroom.

Skills tested: Adaptability, Business Intelligence, Public Speaking, Creativity, Critical Thinking, and Crisis Management.

NOTE नीति.

Risk everything and survive the chaos. NOTE नीति is a live financial simulation where you trade, negotiate, ride out crashes, and make risky calls under pressure, working with real market situations instead of textbook problems.

Round 1

The Money Market Mayhem

Two hours on a live market run through the Élan portal. You invest your Cents across companies that rise and fall, and every five minutes the host announces a new market status: you hold, sell or switch. Your portfolio is valued live, the leaderboard moves with it, and when the final freeze is called your closing capital is locked.

Round 2

The Coin Economy

The floor becomes physical. Every team is handed thirty coins, ten red, ten blue and ten black, and five zones open at once: Dice of Fortune, the Spin Wheel, Stock Market Dart, Investment Plinko and the Bull versus Bear Arena. You choose your own route, you may play any zone twice, and your team can split up to cover more ground. Ninety minutes, then the zones close and your coins are counted.

Qualification

Top three to the Boardroom

Your Round 1 closing capital is added to the value of the coins you finish with. The three teams holding the most combined capital go through to the Cent$ible Boardroom on Day 2.

Skills tested: Strategy, Risk Management, Quick Thinking, Adaptability, Financial Awareness, and Decision-Making.

Real business skills, under pressure.

Cent$ible sits between the classroom and the real business world, and it leans on the same skills a founder, a marketer, or an investor uses every day.

Pillar

Innovation & Entrepreneurship

Turn ideas into ventures and defend them.

Pillar

Finance & Strategy

Read markets, manage risk, make the call.

Pillar

Marketing & Brand Building

Influence an audience and own a narrative.

Pillar

Leadership & Teamwork

Lead a team when the pressure is on.

Pillar

Creativity & Problem Solving

Adapt fast when the brief changes.

Pillar

Communication & Adaptability

Present, persuade, and pivot on your feet.

The Boardroom Finale.

The three highest-scoring teams from every theme come together on Day 2 for the Boardroom Finale, the last stage of Cent$ible and the one that decides the overall championship.

The Boardroom stops being a quiz or a pitch and becomes a business decision-making arena. Finalists are given a business situation drawn from areas such as startup strategy, marketing, finance, brand management, business expansion, crisis management and entrepreneurial decision-making. You analyse the information, identify the opportunity, decide on a course of action, and then justify it to the board.

Judging covers business knowledge, strategic thinking, creativity, decision-making, problem-solving, financial understanding, communication, confidence, teamwork and composure under pressure. The challenge is built to separate a team that knows business concepts from a team that can actually think like business leaders.

Choose Cent$ible and your theme in the registration form. For ages 14 to 20.