A team of Singapore Management University students brought home the championship trophy for the Maritime Singapore Connect (MSC) Maritime Case Summit 2022, organised by the Singapore Maritime Foundation. Now in its 3rd edition, the annual case competition provides tertiary students an opportunity to solve real-world sustainability challenge statements from leading multinational companies in the maritime industry.

The grand finals and prize presentation of the competition was held on 8 April, in conjunction with the Singapore Maritime Week and was graced by Senior Minister of State for Transport, Mr Chee Hong Tat. “This diversity of skills and experiences will be crucial for Maritime Singapore to transform and thrive in the years ahead. We want to attract more young people to join the maritime industry, and to help grow Singapore’s position as a hub port and international maritime centre.” said Mr Chee.

The final 12 teams – from an initial 172 students across 43 registered teams hailing from Singapore’s universities and polytechnics – come from diverse fields such as maritime studies, business, accounting, finance, economics, logistics/supply chain, engineering and more. An SMU team was crowned champions for the BHP challenge. Named “Mixed Greens”, it comprised of Lee Kong Chian School of Business (LKCSB) students Gabrielle Soh Pao Pei (Year 3), Esther Lam (Year 2), Elysia Tng (Year 3) and Oliver Yap (Year 3, School of Accountancy).

The students acted as “consultants” to their client BHP, a multinational mining, metals and petroleum public company, to identify and evaluate the likely “winners” in safety and decarbonisation technologies that will rapidly gain momentum and adoption from 2030 onwards, as well as the impact of future decarbonisation technology on vessel safety.

Another SMU student, Damien Tan (Year 2, LKCSB) was part of “Team Kumquats” which included students from National University of Singapore and Nanyang Technological University.  The team took the first prize under CMA CGM, a French container transportation and shipping company. Their challenge was to expand the group’s solutions that enable shippers to analyse, reduce and offset their carbon footprint; or develop a new portfolio of solutions which can take shippers on the same environmental course beyond decarbonisation.

Ms Sarah Greenough, BHP’s Head of Maritime Supply Chain Sustainability and Excellence, said, “The MSC Maritime Case Summit is an excellent opportunity for undergraduates to understand the current landscape of the maritime industry, particularly the actions being taken around decarbonising the sector. We were overwhelmed by the innovative ideas and perspectives the students brought to help solve some of the challenges that we are facing in reducing emissions across the industry today,”

“Youths like ourselves are vital in driving the decarbonisation agenda and realising these efforts. Our team strongly resonates with the notion that we have to play our part as individuals to protect the planet we reside on. This challenge was a platform for us to channel our passion into action through our proposal,” said Elysia Tng, team leader of Mixed Greens.

For winning each challenge statement, teams win a cash prize of $3,500. Students will also gain valuable opportunities to be mentored by industry professionals and stand to clinch internships with participating companies.