2021 KUBS Challenge – “A Fierce Competition of Ideas”

Korea University Business School (Dean=Johngseok Bae) held the “2021 KUBS Challenge” on Friday, November 12, at the LG-POSCO Building. KUBS Challenge is a contest where teams, each consisting of four business school undergraduate students, analyze a business case in a limited amount of time and make a presentation. In this year’s competition, 48 students from 12 teams participated and showed their case analysis skills.

In this year’s KUBS Challenge, the participants were to analyze the case of the Australian business Zip, which is a BNPL (Buy Now, Pay Later) company. Their mission was to analyze the factors that make the BNPL industry attractive and to suggest a strategy for Zip to compete with major competitors in the BNPL and the credit card industry. During the preliminary round, the 12 teams spent 24 hours analyzing the business case and then submitted a recorded video of the presentation and their presentation slides. Out of the 12 teams, four teams advanced to the finals: △Kkanbu △KU Tigers △Crimson & Company(Crimson & Co.) and △Asya Consulting.

In the final round of the contest, each team was given 10 minutes to present the results of their analysis and 7 minutes for Q&A. △Professor Tony Garrett △Professor Youngkyu Kim and △Professor Sunwoo Hwang participated as judges of the contest. After the presentations, the judges made their final decisions – the third prize went to teams “Kkanbu” and “Asya Consulting,” the second prize went to team “KU Tigers,” and the first prize went to team “Crimson & Company.”

Team “Crimson & Company,” which won the first prize in the competition, was given the opportunity to participate in the “UW Global Business Case Competition 2022” hosted by the University of Washington in 2022. Team “KU Tigers,” which won the second prize, will be participating in the “32^nd Annual Scotiabank International Case Competition” hosted by the Western University of Canada. Lastly, team “Kkanbu” will be participating in the “2022 RSM STAR Case Competition” hosted by the Erasmus University of Netherlands. The three teams will be subsidized with participation fees, airline tickets, and accommodations, and will be given special training before the international competition.

Meanwhile, team “Crimson & Company,” the winner of the first prize, commented that “Although it was tiring due to the lengthened competition period, we were able to invest a lot of time.” “We are proud that our efforts paid out well and achieved a good result,” they added. They expressed their determination to participate in the international competition by saying that “We will do our best to win the international competition.”

Aritlce | Sangbong Chung (College of Political Science and Economics, Department of PSIR 17^th)