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After a thorough evaluation process by over 50 Airbus experts and innovators judging more than 500 ideas, Airbus has selected the 100 teams that have made it into Round Two of the fourth edition of the global student competition Fly Your Ideas organized in partnership with UNESCO.
The 100 teams comprise 413 students representing 48 different nationalities. Of these, five teams comprising of 24 students are from the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology and one team of three students from Auckland University of Technology.
Thanks to a strong drive from Airbus to encourage more diversity, 71 per cent of teams are made up of a mix of students from different countries, studying different subjects, or male and female, all of which Airbus sees as essential ingredients for innovation.
“I am impressed by the diversity of the teams that have made it through to Round Two this year,” said Charles Champion, Airbus executive vice president engineering. “It is very telling of a generation who no longer thinks in silos but instead aspires to collaborate across traditional boundaries such as gender, nationality and discipline. This reflects Airbus’ ambition to work with greater agility across the company, and I am sure our Airbus mentors and experts are very excited about the fresh way of thinking they will get during the next 100 days before the next round.” He adds: “Now the race is starting – best of luck to all!”
Each of the teams has now been attributed an Airbus mentor and an Airbus expert to help take their ideas further and share their insights of real-life aviation constraints over a 100 day period. Just the top five teams will make it to the final and present their ideas at a live event at Airbus facilities in May 2015. The winning team will receive a €30,000 prize, the runner up team €15,000.
What sets Fly Your Ideas apart from other global student competitions is the deep and company-wide engagement of the Airbus teams. The mentors and experts are drawn from right across the business, and include non-technical professionals as well as engineers and aviation experts.
Find out more and follow the activity of each team at their dedicated pages on www.airbus-fyi.com
