Via LOOP Jamaica 

One lucky group of University of Technology, Jamaica (UTech) students will be walking away with a grand prize of $500,000, following the final pitch presentation in the Sagicor/UTech Innovation Lab’s Smart Society Innovation challenge.

The Innovation Challenge, which was launched earlier this year and its application period closed in March, saw a total of 18 teams making submissions of their innovation ideas; the ideas submitted spanned various areas, to include – transportation, health and wellness, financial services, environment, real estate and education.

The winning team will be announced in July, following the final pitch presentation, which will see the shortlisted teams vying for the cash prize as well as bragging rights. Ahead of the presentations, teams will be exposed to various workshops to help them prepare for pitch day; these workshops include - Design Thinking, which will focus on helping teams to come up with solutions/ideas for improved client experience and The Art of Presenting a Pitch workshop, which will help teams to come up with creative, practical and functional ways to best communicate and present their ideas in a visually appealing and interesting way.

Recently, on May 4, approximately 80 students from the 13 shortlisted teams joined President and CEO of Sagicor Group Jamaica, Christopher Zacca, for an interactive session via Zoom online, where he congratulated the teams on them making it to the final pitch and encouraged them to keep creating and innovating and coming up with cutting edge solutions that will help persons in their everyday lives.

“Thank you all for participating in the Sagicor/UTech Smart Society Challenge and congratulations to you all for your brilliant and innovative ideas that have made it to the next round of the competition”, Zacca said.

Zacca also commended the University for its leadership in producing top-class graduates who contribute so much to work-force in various fields. “Congratulations to the University of Technology, Jamaica for continuing to groom these bright minds and producing countless world-class leaders,” he added.