A group of four students from the Faculty of Business (FOB) namely Siti Afiqah Muhammed, Aimi Suhaili Mohmad Tahir, Nicklaus Gan Zhau Hern and Aniq Hamizan Khairul Aizan competed as one of the finalists at the Hult Prize Kuala Lumpur Regional Summit recently. The students formed a team called “Brighter Bees” with the guidance of their mentor, Mr. Vincent Chan. Prior to competing in the Regional Summit, the team emerged as the campus winner after competing with 7 amazing teams.
During the regional level, more than 60 universities participated and Brighter Bees managed to be shortlisted in the Top 6. Due to Covid-19 outbreak, the organiser changed the competition format to a virtual competition. The team submitted a video presentation and went through a Virtual Interview with the panels. The team came up with an innovative idea called Si-Cup, and it is a takeaway cup that is made up of biodegradable materials that are embedded with seeds. This product conjured up with hopes that it could eliminate waste, use sustainable materials as well as change the mentality of the people and transform the overall attitude of the public regarding general wastes.
Hult Prize is an annual competition that serves as an avenue to challenge university students to solve pressing social issues such as food security, water access, energy, and education. The competition encourages a generation to change the world, and the selected topic for this year is “Building start-ups that have a positive impact on our planet with every dollar earned.” As a result, students from Universitas Gadjah Mada, Indonesia emerged as the 2020 Kuala Lumpur Regional Winner. They will go to Boston to compete with other contestants around the world and to win 1 million dollars to work on their innovation.
