The foodpanda Innovation Scholarship aims to encourage students to make use of their creative ideas to create a real-life business. The scholarship serves as a strong financial motivation for young adults to gain knowledge and search for opportunities in the market. foodpanda believes that developing a persuasive business proposal is the first step to fulfil one’s business dream. This year, we awarded a HK$12,000 innovation scholarship to two outstanding candidates who proposed a mobile app to offer an authentic local experience of Hong Kong to tourists.
Awardees, Sibbie Ho and Melody Ko came from distinctive backgrounds, yet they share the same passion towards digital marketing, which was a force to join them together. Final year student Sibbie majors in Commerce at the Queen’s University in Canada, where she found her great passion for accounting. Third-year student Melody majors in Information Management at the City University of Hong Kong. With this academic background, she worked as the intern in the field of banking, accounting and customer service in order to gain experience. Two of them met during Sibbie’s exchange study at the City University of Hong Kong. The shared interest in e-commerce drove Sibbie and Melody together to make collaboration on the creation of a mobile app.
Thank you @foodpanda_hongkong for this award. Hope to create our startup soon
A post shared by ♚ S I B B I E ♚ (@sibbieho) on
As an accounting student, Sibbie applied her accounting skills and knowledge to the mathematics session of the project. With the knowledge background in programming and app design, Melody was responsible for the programme development of the mobile app and website. Under this clear division of labour, their business plan ran quite smoothly.In spite of the enjoyment, Sibbie revealed that there were challenges: “We had so many ideas but it was hard to make all of them feasible”. Melody added, “It was difficult to convert theories into solid arguments that support our ideas”. Challenges did not stop them from pursuing their goal, yet they worked hard on the solutions: “We decided to cut the ideas to the bone so as to find the unique features for our app … To clear things up, we always discussed the details before working on our parts.” Eventually, they overcame all those difficulties and won this scholarship.
The two were thrilled to receive the scholarship. Melody revealed her feeling toward this scholarship “Proposing business plan was so exciting as if we were looking to our new-born baby.” She added ”This is a fruitful experience. Undergraduates may easily get lost between life and studies. Winning this scholarship gives us confidence, and we are encouraged to do what we want to do in life. Moreover, the scholarship can fund those who lack the economic resources to realize a start-up!”. Sibbie also agreed that scholarship is a golden opportunity for the youngsters to pursue their dream, “The millennials need to step out of their comfort zone to explore different possibilities. Set your goals, grasp every opportunity, and follow it with your heart.” said Sibbie.
The scholarship opportunity also helped them to figure out the clear goals of future. Melody is set herself a goal of running a startup company of innovative business after graduation. Sibbie is also determined to pursue her career in the field of business and law, so she plans to study the Juris Doctor (JD) programme to build her law basis for the future.