On Friday 29 March, 10 Kent Business School students participated in the SAS Digital Challenge.
The Digital Challenge 2019 was hosted by SAS at their London office for 41 University students. Representing the University of Kent were nine MSc Digital Marketing and Analytics students and one MSc Business Analytics student from Kent Business School (KBS).
Students were allocated into six teams to promote collaboration between different universities and backgrounds. They spent the day working and interacting with an entire SAS team that included senior directors, data analysts and SAS customers from Liverpool Victoria and RSA.
The challenge was based around the significant growth of cycle use across European cities. The brief focused on teams developing the next generation of insurance products for millennials and eco-conscious individuals. The use of IoT devices for bicycle security, health and fitness monitoring was also explored as a key incentive that the company could offer.
Teams had to help shape one of these new products or services and produce a marketing plan for the company. They were joined by a technical and business support team to help build, run, and refine their design and prototype(s). All teams developed interesting ideas, using different data sources including data collected from a short bike ride in the area using a sensor provided for the task.
The final ideas were pitched to a group of judges, ‘Dragons Den’ style. Entries were judged on factors including consumer expectations, resources required and idea potential. KBS students were placed within the top three winning teams which included; the winners, Team 6, with How Kian Chun and Xiaotong Zhang. Team 1, featured Samiha Ali who came in second place and was praised for their innovative idea. Third place was awarded to students Eleta Donald Kostandin and Terry Atkins from Team 2, who are both also studying MSc Digital Marketing and Analytics at Kent Business School.
Congratulations to all winners and participants!
The top three groups from the competition will attend the biggest business analytics SAS forum in the UK on 25 June, 2019. The forum takes places in Birmingham and the students will present to over 500 practitioners and managers from different industries such as retailing, manufacturing and banking.
Find out more about our postgraduate courses and watch the March SAS Student Challenge 2019