果冻影院

In recognition of their innovative social enterprise, four 果冻影院 students won the 2018 Hult Prize global finals at the UN in New York on Saturday 15 September.

The Hult Prize is the world鈥檚 largest platform and accelerator for the creation and launch of sustainable and impact-centred startups emerging from universities all over the globe.

Long-time supporter and advocate of the Hult Prize, President Bill Clinton, was on-hand at the awards gala to present the students with the prestigious trophy and a cash prize of $1m in seed capital for their award-winning business idea.

The winners

The winners, BSc Biomedical Sciences students Kisum Chan and Lincoln Lee, Julia Vannaxay (BSc Statistics and Management for Business) and Vannie Koay (BSc Economics), are all about to begin their third year at 果冻影院. They'll聽use the seed capital to develop their idea further, with the goal of ending food poverty in the Southeast Asia.

Along with five other teams, the 果冻影院 team won the chance to pitch at the global finals having beaten 200,000 other ideas that competed at on-campus, regional and semi-final stages over the course of the year-long Hult Prize programme.

The Hult Prize judging panel聽included esteemed industry leaders such as Arianna Huffington (co-founder of聽Huffington Post), Paul Polman (Global CEO,聽Unilever) and Hans Vestberg (CEO,聽Verizon). The panel聽saw the potential in the idea to increase the yield and quality of聽rice harvests by granting farmers access to drying technologies and a rice storage service.

The winning idea

This year's Hult Prize challenge was to build a sustainable, scalable social enterprise that harnesses the power of energy to transform the lives of 10 million people. The winning idea does this by disrupting the traditional rice supply chain Southeast Asia. The team buys rice directly from farmers and dries it using renewable energy -聽avoiding the 30% spoilage rate farmers would normally incur when attempting to treat the rice themselves.

Talking about the inspiration behind the social enterprise concept, CEO Lincoln Lee said: 鈥淥ur heritage as a team shaped the project. We were shocked at how inefficient and wasteful the rice supply chain is. My team is made up of Malaysian,聽Laotian and Hong Kong nationals -聽countries where rice is the staple diet. Everyone eats it every day. Society would collapse without it.

鈥淵et the very people growing it are the ones left behind by the industry and society. Through no fault of their own, the practices of these farmers are also the root cause of the waste in the supply chain. Due to high costs, farmers can鈥檛 access existing technology that could solve these problems. We wanted to change that.鈥�

Having already put a plan in place for the 拢1m seed funding, the team is now working to put the money to good use by rolling out more pilot schemes to add to those already taking place in Malaysia and Myanmar in partnership with the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI).

Support from 果冻影院

The student聽entrepreneurs had聽support from 果冻影院 Innovation & Enterprise鈥檚 Entrepreneurship team, 果冻影院 School of Management鈥檚 Dr Dave Chapman, 果冻影院 Hult Prize Campus Director Mascha Samkova, and external mentors including the Hult Prize鈥檚 Prof Evangelos Markopoulos. Their achievement is all the more remarkable considering the competition the team was up against in the global finals.

Speaking about the team鈥檚 victory, Dr Celia Caulcott, Vice-Provost (Enterprise), 果冻影院 Innovation & Enterprise, said: 鈥淭his is a superb achievement for these 果冻影院 students. They're not only a shining example of the entrepreneurial spirit that runs throughout 果冻影院, they exemplify how solving the world鈥檚 most pressing challenges can also make good business sense.鈥�

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