Vi vann! The Nordic Case Competition är inte bara lärorik utan ...

MANY WAYS OUT OF
FINLAND
Sooner or later, internationalisation will be on the agenda
for a growing company. And then the really big challenges
begin. In November Hanken alumni and students were invited
to a seminar on entrepreneurship and internationalisation.
Twenty years ago it was easy to know how to proceed
in order to achieve good sales figures abroad. According to
Jan Sten, a consultant in entrepreneurship, simply going to
Sweden and starting there was enough. But in today’s world,
there are infinite paths to choose from.
– Every entrepreneur needs to find his own way, Jan
Sten noted.
Dag Sandås, alumnus of the year, has a long career in
entrepreneurial firms. Among other achievements, he has
partaken in the development of Vacon, a company that was
later publicly listed. Now he works at The Switch.
To survive as an entrepreneur, you must be able to tolerate
uncertainty.
– You need to be sure to have the right kind of people
around you. If you’re the type who always plays it safe, you
should forget about entrepreneurship.
William Wolfram, the founder and CEO of Deal Dash,
is of the same opinion. The focus needs to be on building a
good team.
– I only hire people who are smarter than I and who somehow
complement me and the team.
After the actual seminar, a pitching competition was held
and it was won by a health application by a company called
Framgo.
Do you go to the gym regularly but find no significant difference
in your weight? It may be due to muscle mass weighing
more than fat. In order to motivate yourself to keep going
to the gym, entrepreneur and Hanken student Kenneth
Salonius of Framgo had an idea. You attach a belt on your
body and a watch shows you your fat percentage and all the
necessary data is displayed on your smart phone.
The other companies that participated in the pitching
competition were Sayduck, Palm Opinion and Breakit. All
had three minutes to convince the jury.
William Wolfram.
PH OTO: PATRI K LINDSTRÖM
AVSNITTSBESKRIVNING
BRIEF IN ENGLISH
RELIEF SUPPLY CHAIN
MANAGEMENT
The cost of transportation in aid operations and of supplies
in crisis areas is very high. To make aid deliveries succeed it
is crucial that local actors are involved in the work, not just
aid workers flown in from major aid organisations.
– Cooperation between different actors in terms of disaster
relief, development aid and transportation of medical
supplies for emergency help to depressed regions is very important
in humanitarian logistics, explains Professor Karen
Spens.
The research institute HUMLOG, founded by Hanken
and the National Defence University of Finland (NDU), focuses
on research in humanitarian logistics. In October the
book Relief Supply Chain Management for Disasters: Humanitarian
Aid and Emergency Logistics, edited by Gyöngyi
Kovács, Director of the HUMLOG-institute and Professor
Karen Spens, was published.
The HUMLOG Institute was founded in 2008. The aim
of the HUMLOG Institute is to share and disseminate knowledge
in issues related to humanitarian logistics.
THE NORDIC CASE COMPE-
TITION BROUGHT OUT THE
BEST PROBLEM SOLVERS
A private equity firm is considering buying Ducati, an Italian
motorcycle company. Sounds like a case for an investment
bank or a consulting firm, but this time it was students from
Hanken, Aalto University School of Business and Stockholm
School of Economics who were to come up with a solution.
It was time for the second The Nordic Case Competition organised
by the student unions of Hanken and the Aalto University
Business School. A total of 21 persons participated,
seven from each school. Participants were selected from over
80 applicants.
On the first day, all teams commented on Ducati’s business
plan and the price of the transaction. The three best
teams went on to the finals. On the final day the three final
groups presented their investment plan and the jury, consisting
of representatives of Danske Bank and Boston Consulting
Group, chose a winner.
The competition was won by team number five, consisting
of Richard Cawén and Katrin Ahlbäck from Hanken
and Julia Fagerberg from SSE. The teams were formed combining
students with different majors from different schools.
Events like The Nordic Case Competition are very important
opportunities for students to present themselves to
potential employers, but the networking aspect is equally
important.
Besides a bottle of champagne, the winners of the competition
also won a job interview at BCG and a dinner with
representatives of the management of Danske Bank. And, of
course, precious contacts.
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