Business Case for Engineers – 2021
Back to Competitions | The University of Surrey’s Foundation Year ‘Business Case for Engineers’ is an assessed component of the ENG0014 Engineering and Physical Sciences Laboratory and Project module. This project provides students with an insight into the entrepreneurial aspects and the multi-disciplinary nature of engineering and science and enhances skills in a variety of areas including presentation, teamwork, managing deadlines, and idea generation. Students work in groups to make a business case for an engineering, IT, communications, or physical sciences-based idea. Students produce a written report outlining their business case and pitch their ideas to fellow students and academic staff members in a symposium.
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First Prize Winner: Civil Connect
Niamh Gallagher, Amelia Dos Santos, Ilayza Ors, Jamal Omene-Stewart and Aleena Joy, all Foundation Year Civil Engineering Students – £1,500 Engineers in Business Prize
Civil Connect is an app-based platform to connect early-career civil engineers with work projects, helping them to gain experience in their field through relevant paid work whilst providing an affordable alternative for clients with smaller or less technical briefs.
Second Prize Winner: Movement Industries
Sam Barrett, Mechanical Engineering; Harvey Nixon, Mechanical Engineering; Visura Herath, Electrical and Electronic Engineering; Sam Tingle, Physics; Shaun Field, Physics; Kushal Shah, Physics – £1,000 Engineers in Business Prize
Movement Industries provides low-cost entry-level flight computers for model rockets used to collect and record data from the flight of the rocket, fire the parachutes and land the rocket safely. The flight computers also offer thrust vector-controlled flight with onboard calculations that can be adjusted to each customer’s rockets. The aim is to create an easier route to becoming involved with model rocketry and engineering by making it more available and affordable to beginners who have an interest in the aerospace field. The product makes this possible because it saves individuals from research time and design time as the rockets are already readily available to them and at a low cost.
Third Prize Winner: EcoEfficient
Marianne Entwisle, Chemical & Process Engineering; Georgia Paton, Chemical & Process Engineering, Bea Santiago-Santos, Chemical & Process Engineering and Atifa Aziz, Civil & Environmental Engineering – £500 Engineers in Business Prize
EcoEfficient is a waste recycling enterprise that tackles the huge problem of single-use face masks littering that has become rife in post-covid society. The initiative benefits the environment by collecting hazardous face mask waste that has been unethically discarded and processes them to create new, useful materials to be sold to industry for use in road construction.
Positive feedback
The addition of the Engineers in Business competition to our Foundation Year module gave a great incentive to our mixed discipline teams; inspiring young engineers all at the very start of their University careers to think about how to make their ideas viable for real-world application!
Kat Mack, Student Enterprise Manager, University of Surrey
The Engineers in Business (EIB) competition injected an extra element of excitement and competitiveness into our Engineering and Physical Sciences Foundation Year students at the University of Surrey. Our Foundation Year students represent a diverse mix of individuals with a variety of educational backgrounds and a larger proportion from the highest areas of deprivation compared with university averages. Groups used their diversity of experiences to their advantage and produced creative business cases for an engineering idea, many of which demonstrated a true passion for their topic. It has been a challenging year on many fronts for our students, including having to carry out this project completely online; the endorsement and recognition afforded by the EIB sponsoring this competition bolstered motivation for our students and, for some, has cemented a passion that will drive them forwards in their studies and careers. Thank you for your support!
Carol Spencely, Teaching Fellow (Learning Development), University of Surrey