Media Releases

Hult Prize Competition Begins with University of Toronto Qualifying Round

September 29, 2016

Toron­to, ON – The world’s biggest com­pe­ti­tion for young social entre­pre­neurs and stu­dents gets start­ed at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Toron­to with an infor­ma­tion ses­sion on Octo­ber 11.

The annu­al com­pe­ti­tion for the Hult Prize aims to iden­ti­fy and launch the most com­pelling social busi­ness ideas—start-up enter­pris­es that tack­le grave issues faced by bil­lions of peo­ple. Win­ners receive USD 1 mil­lion in seed cap­i­tal, as well as men­tor­ship and advice from the inter­na­tion­al busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty.  In the 2015 com­pe­ti­tion, Team Attol­lo, com­posed of MBA stu­dents and alum­ni from UofT’s Rot­man School of the Man­age­ment, reached the glob­al final. Last year four UofT teams reached the region­al finals held in Dubai, San Fran­cis­co, Lon­don UK and Shang­hai.

“Teams from UofT are unique­ly posi­tioned to per­form well in the Hult Prize com­pe­ti­tion due to the num­ber of world-class pro­grams rang­ing from busi­ness to pub­lic health and engi­neer­ing to social work as well as the incred­i­ble diver­si­ty of the back­grounds and expe­ri­ences of the stu­dents,” says Tina Assi, MBA’17, who is the Hult Prize Cam­pus Direc­tor for the Uni­ver­si­ty of Toron­to.  “It is the cross-dis­ci­pli­nary teams who have tra­di­tion­al­ly been most suc­cess­ful in tack­ling these glob­al issues.”

For the third year in a row, a spe­cial quar­ter­fi­nal qual­i­fy­ing round will be held for the Hult Prize at the Rot­man School on Sat­ur­day, Decem­ber 3. Par­tic­i­pat­ing teams must include three to four stu­dents of any UofT fac­ul­ty — includ­ing under­grads, mas­ters and PhD stu­dents. One mem­ber may be a grad­u­ate of a UofT pro­gram. The win­ning team will pro­ceed to the region­al finals to be held in March 2017. The infor­ma­tion ses­sion on Octo­ber 11 will pro­vide addi­tion details for stu­dents who are inter­est­ed in par­tic­i­pat­ing in the qual­i­fy­ing round includ­ing fur­ther details on the chal­lenge, a review of win­ning strate­gies by past com­peti­tors, and the ses­sion will also allow stu­dents to meet stu­dents from across cam­pus to form teams. Fur­ther infor­ma­tion and reg­is­tra­tion for the ses­sion is online. Ques­tions may be direct­ed to hultprizetoronto@gmail.com.

This year’s chal­lenge is “Refugees — Reawak­en­ing Human Poten­tial and Restor­ing the Dig­ni­ty of 10M Peo­ple by 2022.”  It will focus on restor­ing the rights and dig­ni­ty of peo­ple and soci­eties who may be, or are forced into motion due to social injus­tices, pol­i­tics, eco­nom­ic pres­sures, cli­mate change and war.

The Rot­man School of Man­age­ment is locat­ed in the heart of Canada’s com­mer­cial and cul­tur­al cap­i­tal and is part of the Uni­ver­si­ty of Toron­to, one of the world’s top 20 research uni­ver­si­ties. The Rot­man School fos­ters a new way to think that enables our grad­u­ates to tack­le today’s glob­al busi­ness and soci­etal chal­lenges.  For more infor­ma­tion, vis­it www.rotman.utoronto.ca.

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For more infor­ma­tion:

Ken McGuf­fin
Man­ag­er, Media Rela­tions
Rot­man School of Man­age­ment
Uni­ver­si­ty of Toron­to
Tel: 416.946.3818
E‑mail: mcguffin@rotman.utoronto.ca

Fol­low Rot­man on Twit­ter @rotmanschool
Watch Rot­man on You Tube www.youtube.com/rotmanschool