Imperial’s new students got a taste of entrepreneurship as we kicked-off the academic year with an afternoon of online entrepreneurial activities.
Idea Challenge invited students from across the College to participate in tackling London’s sustainability challenges, in just five hours! The students were placed in 17 interdisciplinary teams and asked to drill down into one of the following challenges: energy, waste, climate change, air quality, green infrastructure and noise.
Once a specific problem was identified through a challenge mapping exercise, the teams worked on fleshing out a customer profile and devising a solution to the problem they had chosen to address. The teams then had time to refine their idea and create a three-minute pitch to present to the judges.
The winners were decided by splitting the teams in to three breakout rooms, each with judges from the Enterprise Lab team. Each set of judges decided on a winner from their breakout room to take home a prize, which included a £50 Amazon voucher, entrepreneurial books and a 1-month Headspace subscription for each team member.
The winners are:
e-RIX
Solving the issue of congested, high-emission roads and Londoner’s need to get to meetings and events quickly, e-RIX propose an electronic fleet of rickshaws as an alternative to UBER.
Water Buoys
In order to meet London’s increasing green energy targets, Water Buoys will create a hydrofoil buoy system to harness the kinetic energy of the river Thames.
Bloom
Tackling the issue of air pollution in the city and the effects on people’s health, Bloom plan to create algae-based air purifiers for offices that double as a break-out space.
