A team of HKUST undergraduate students won the 2014 Scotiabank International Case Competition organized by the Ivey Business School in Canada. Although the case subject was about Canadian agriculture, an unfamiliar topic for Hong Kong students, the team outperformed their peers from other top business schools around the world and impressed the judges with their thoughtful analysis and practical business solution.
Professor Emily Nason, Associate Dean and Director of Undergraduate Programs at the HKUST Business School, said, "Case analysis is one of the key learning experiences provided by our programs. Students are presented with business challenges, which can help them develop business sense and critical thinking skills, and be better prepared for future careers."
The HKUST team comprised four undergraduate students from the Business School: Rex Sin, Kelsey Zhu, Jessica Kwok, and Kenneth Chan. Although the team has limited knowledge about the technology, the agricultural market and the country, they impressed the judges with an in-depth analysis and a practical solution by applying what they learnt from class.
According to the team's analysis, farms in Ontario are mostly located in remote sites and widespread across the province, and most farmers due to their age have limited experience in using new technology. The team suggested instead of directly selling the service to farmers, the company should partner with intermediaries to introduce the service to the farmers. This approach would help the company minimize overhead costs and speed up its business growth by harnessing its partners' networks.
Kelsey and Jessica attributed their success to the pre-competition preparation, in which they completed four case studies, and the clearly defined roles and responsibilities of each member.
The contenders of the competition were given a real-life business case, in which they were requested to develop business strategies for a new service for soil analysis introduced by a Canadian company, A&L Canada Laboratories Inc. A&L is one of Ontario's largest agricultural laboratories specializing in soil, plant and water testing. The new service allows farmers to collect aerial images of their farms with a small unmanned aircraft equipped with a camera and GPS mapping technology. The analysis of the aerial images collected can help the farmers determine with precision when and where water, fertilizer and pesticides are needed, further boosting their harvest.
Professor Emily Nason added, "I am proud of the remarkable performance by the team. Their practice sessions were particularly challenging as one of the team members, Kenneth Chan, was on overseas exchange, yet the team managed to practice across time zones through video conferencing. The result demonstrates their tremendous dedication."
To further promote case analysis learning across the Business School, one of the winning team members, Rex, together with four other classmates started a student-led Case Analysis Team. The school-wide initiative aims not only to create a platform for students from different business programs and study years to share their experiences of case competitions, but also to promote a culture of case study learning.
Rex explained, "International case contests provide a chance to students to compete with the brightest business students around the world and make us improve. We hope to gather students with experience in case competitions and transfer our knowledge and experience to other classmates in a structured manner."
He added, "We are at the beginning stage and recruiting members. We will arrange different activities including experience-sharing sessions by senior students and alumni, advice and support from the faculty members, and training on case analysis and problem solving. A mechanism to select and send teams to international case competitions will also be established."
Professor Paul Forster, Case Competition Program Faculty Advisor of the HKUST Business School, said, "Case competitions enable students to discover for themselves real-world business issues and experience what it is like to work with clients. It is encouraging to see a group of self-motivated students form the Case Analysis Team that is open to all business students. The School will work with the team to ensure they have the support and training they need."
This year marks the twenty-fifth anniversary of the Scotiabank International Case Competition at the Ivey Business School, the Western University. Participating teams came from the business schools of:
Hong Kong University of Science & Technology, Hong Kong, China (Champion)
University of British Columbia, Canada (Finalist)
University of Florida, USA (Finalist)
Maastricht University, Netherlands (Finalist)
University of Southern California, USA
National University of Singapore, Singapore
University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China
Northeastern University, USA
Singapore Management University, Singapore
University of Otago, New Zealand
University of Munster, Germany
Corvinus University of Budapest, Hungary
Shantou University, China
For media enquiries, please feel free to contact:
HKUST Business School Communications & External Affairs
Mr John Poon
Tel: (852) 3469 2090
Email: johnpoon@ust.hk
Ms Anna Chan
Tel: (852) 2358 8242
Email: annachan@ust.hk
