When Team Fishyu walked off with the grand prize of THB 500,000 in the Grand Final Pitching of the HACKaTHAILAND Competition and Beyond, it was one more accolade to add to those our students have been consistently bagging. Along with Fishyu, the Bachelor of Science in Integrated Innovation (BAScii) program had three of the final 10 teams competing at HACKaTHAILAND. In a way, BAScii students were also competing against each other.
Participating in and winning entrepreneurial contests, startup contests, and hackathons has become routine at BAScii because the program has been so successful within an exceedingly short timeframe. Launched just three years ago, BAScII, and more importantly its students, have won laurels that are the envy of many who have been in the game for decades.
Yet recognition has not been limited to contests held in Thailand alone. An impressive 26 BAScii students have made their mark in international pitches and contests, some winning awards, others receiving recognition and honors. From Singapore to Australia and from Nanning to Cairo, our students have been everywhere, winning awards, and catching the eye of experts and investors alike. They are among the 74 BAScii students who have won accolades in various contests during the past three years.
“Innovations are hard to come by, and we always tell our students that startup can fail. “However, our students have proved us wrong by not only innovating but also by showing the world that their projects are realistic and help solve real-world problems,” notes Professor Worsak Kanok-Nukulchai, Executive Director of Chulalongkorn School of Integrated Innovation (SCII).
BAScII Projects have also attracted investors, and one startup in telemedicine for pets received an investment of four million THB in addition to being featured in the prominent English daily The Bangkok Post. Yet another project is on the verge of being registered as a startup.
Student innovations have also been significant for their relevance to society, as seen when one of them reached the semi-final of a competition sponsored by the Anti-Corruption Organization of Thailand and another achieved third place in a National Innovation Agency (NIA) contest. Pitch topics have also included sustainability and helping the elderly. Furthermore, students have been featured prominently in contests organized by the corporate sector, be it Amazon Web Services, fashion icons such as L’Oréal, insurance provider Prudential, and energy major Schneider Electric. BAScii students have also won awards in contests organized by Thai majors such as CP and SCG.
“It is a reiterative process in which students come up with ideas and try to convince ScII faculty members. We tell them: How can you convince the world if you can’t convince us?,” says Dr. Ronnakorn Vaiyavuth, an innovation evangelist and faculty member at ScII. Students immediately go back to the drawing board and return with a better idea and a more realistic business plan. This is what makes their projects practical and likely winners, adds Dr. Ronnakorn.
Yet BAScii success extends beyond innovation contests. This year, BASci students also won the international football tournament held at Chulalongkorn University. It was their first win in that competition, and all the more impressive given that ScII still do not have enough students. The fourth cohort of students will join BAScII in September 2022, by which time all four cohorts will be training their minds and bodies and continue winning awards.
To view a complete list of BAScii award winners, please visit this Link
