The Hult Prize is the world’s largest student competition for social good. The annual, year-long competition crowd-sources ideas from MBA and college students after challenging them to solve a pressing social issue around topics such as food security, water access, energy, and education. The Hult family – founders of EF Education First – donates USD 1 million in seed capital to help the winning team launch a social enterprise. The Prize is a partnership between Hult International Business School and the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI). Bill Clinton selects the challenge topic and announces the winner each September. Clinton mentioned the Hult Prize in a TIME Magazine article about “the top 5 ideas that are changing the world for the better.”
Contents
History
In 2009, Hult Prize CEO and Founder Ahmad Ashkar left the banking industry during the economic downturn to pursue an MBA at Hult International Business School. A lecture given by One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) Director Chuck Kane introduced Ashkar to the concept of social entrepreneurship and sparked his idea for the Hult Prize (originally called the Hult Global Case Challenge). In 2013, the Prize attracted more than 10,000 MBA and undergraduate applicants.
Award Process
Organizers host regional rounds of competition each spring in Boston, San Francisco, London, Dubai, and Shanghai, plus an online-only round, with a final “pitch-off” held at the Clinton Global Initiative annual meeting each fall. Regional and online winners are invited to participate in the Hult Accelerator, an intensive program held at Hult International Business School in Boston each summer. The 2013 Global Finals took place at Clinton’s annual CGI meeting in New York City in September.
Award Money
In 2010, the Hult family decided to donate USD 1 million each year to fund the Hult Prize recipients. The winning student team is awarded USD1 million in seed capital to launch their idea as a social enterprise.
Partnerships
In 2010, the competition focused on education in partnership with One Laptop Per Child. The 2011 event partnered with water.org to focus on the provision of clean water. In 2012, Hult Prize partnered with Habitat for Humanity, One Laptop Per Child, and Solaraid to address poverty through the provision of education, housing, and energy. The 2013 event inaugurated the Prize’s formal partnership with CGI and addressed the global food crisis.
Prominent Winners
The 2011 Hult Prize was won by a business school team from Cambridge University headed by MBA student Akanksha Hazari, who went on to implement their winning idea, m.Paani. The company is now based in Mumbai, India, and develops impact-focused loyalty programs that leverage mobile technology to under-served communities.
The 2013 Hult Prize was won by a team from McGill University headed by MD / MBA Student Mohammed Ashour. The team continues to implement their idea of growing edible insects for food and feed under the name Aspire The company is based out of Montreal, Canada, and has active operations in Ghana, Mexico, and the United States.
The Hult Prize 2014 was won by a team from the Indian School of Business, called NanoHealth. NanoHealth specialises in chronic disease management and provides holistic and affordable healthcare at the doorstep. NanoHealth creates a network of community health workers called ’Saathis’ and equips them with a low-cost point-of-care device called the Doc-in-a-Bag. NanoHealth aims to avoid more than a million pre-mature deaths every year by providing affordable healthcare at the door step of the urban poor.