Students from Australia, Hong Kong, France, Peru and several other countries gathered in Mary Gates Hall on Saturday for the UW Business School's 9th annual Global Business Case Competition (GBCC).

Students were given a business case on Thursday and had 48 hours to devise the best possible solution. This year's case required students to create a plan for the global expansion of vCustomer, a call center service headquartered in Kirkland, Wash.

Members of the Global Team, including representatives from Brazil, Denmark, Singapore and the UW, said they never realized the difficulty of creating presentations.

"We've been drinking a lot of Seattle coffee," said Harald Tolleshaug

The Global Team's member from Denmark.

The 16 teams competed in a preliminary round, after which four finalists were determined: the National University of Singapore, the Global Team, Concordia University and Copenhagen Business School.

Each team was given 15 minutes to present its solution, followed by an in-depth 15-minute question and answer session with the five judges, one of whom was Sanjay Kumar, founder of vCustomer.

An impressive aspect of the competition is that, although English is not the first language for many of the students, all present their cases in it, said Andrea Gomes, assistant director of the Global Business Center and program manager for GBCC.

Copenhagen Business School was announced as the GBCC 2007 winner Saturday night at the event's awards banquet.

Students competed simultaneously, although not against Corporate Track teams, which consisted of members from the surrounding business community with less than five years experience.

The winning Corporate Track team included members from Ascentium, Microsoft and Starbucks.

While the week was stressful, participants did get a chance to enjoy Seattle.

"I really like [Seattle]. ... We got to see the best and brightest part of the culture," said Gabriel De Marco Gaspar Pinto from Brazil.

The students took a cruise around Lake Union, visited the Ballard Locks, had lunch with members of the Puget Sound business community and had a dance after the competition Saturday night.

Some students also attended a Mariners game.

"This is usually one of the most memorable experiences the students have," said senior Lanna Wei, co-chair of the event. "You get to meet people from all around the world."

Reach reporter Shauna Nuckles at news@thedaily.washington.edu.