Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) (BSE: 532540, NSE: TCS) announced that the winner of the 2022 TCS UK Sustainathon is Team Futureproof from the London School of Economics. The five members of the team, Tianyu Zou, Meiqi Li, Yuluo Cai, Yufei Feng and Wanqi Zhong, have each won a four-week paid internship with TCS.
The Sustainathon is a problem-solving competition that asks university students across the UK to address environmental challenges using new digital technologies. The competition attracted 21 entries across five different challenges, representing 12 different universities across the UK and Ireland.
Challenges were set by TCS’ customers including Lloyds Banking Group, Marks & Spencer, broadband provider Community Fibre Limited, insurance company Phoenix Group, and the Improvement Service in Scotland. The month-long programme offered expert guidance and tuition in the form of webinars, master classes and drop-in sessions as the teams competed to solve their chosen challenge.
The winning idea from Team Futureproof, a digital solution ‘SustainSparks’, was submitted in response to a challenge set by Marks & Spencer, asking ‘How can M&S help customers make sustainable choices, influence suppliers to make sustainable decisions, and ensure the organisation remains profitable, especially when we face living cost challenges?’.
“At TCS, we believe that technology has a huge role to play in solving some of the pressing sustainability issues facing industry and society at large. Through this competition, TCS aims to inspire and guide university students to come up with creative and innovative technology solutions to real-world sustainability problems,” commented Gopalan Rajagopalan, Head, TCS Scotland.
“The submissions presented by the students who took part in this year’s Sustainathon were of an extremely high standard, and many produced truly innovative solutions to the problems businesses face today as they aim to move to net zero,” said Beata Mosio, Senior Technology Programme Manager, Marks & Spencer. “Sustainability has always been very important to our organisation and technology and innovation are key enablers in our race towards sustainability.”
“Sustainability is rapidly growing as a sector offering exciting and creative opportunities for young people,” commented Moyra Boland, Professor of Creative Pedagogy & Dean for Global engagement in Central and South Asia, University of Glasgow. “We know the current cohort of students are highly motivated by ‘green jobs’, so the chance for them to get such hands-on experience in the professional sector over the past few weeks is brilliant. The network that TCS has across business, government, and academia means that together we can inspire and educate the next generation of talent through initiatives like the Sustainathon.”
“Sustainathon is such a precious opportunity for university students to come up with our innovative solution surrounding the real-world issues that companies are facing under this time of green revolution and living-cost crisis,” said Tianyu Zou, member of the winning group, Team Futureproof. “The mentor session and masterclasses presented by TCS enabled us to tackle these challenges not just from a student or consumer’s perspective, but also from a business’ practical point of view. It’s our pleasure to participate in the internship with TCS next year to put our efforts into projects that contribute to a more sustainable future.”
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