How did you find out about the challenge and why did you decide to take part?

Hanna: I was encouraged by one of my supervisors to join the Circular Challenge to expand my sustainable venturing skills. I decided to sign up, as I’m always up for these kinds of extra-curricular activities – they are both fun and you get to learn a lot!

What was the task of the challenge and what did you specifically do there?

Hanna: The challenge was kicked off with introductions by the companies we were going to work with. They introduced their circular economy strategies and the challenges they were facing. It became evident that all three companies were at different stages of transitioning towards circular economy. Our challenge provider was CEWE, a photographic processing company from Germany and actually the leading company in this field in Europe. They tasked us with developing an innovative idea for photo recycling.

Over two days, my group developed the idea to update CEWE’s instant photo printing machines that are set up in drug stores across the country with an integrated recycling module. This new function would allow customers to instantly return photos that they didn’t like or that didn’t turn out well, and receive a store discount. This would allow CEWE to increase their photo recycling rate.

What was your experience like? What was particularly fun and what was particularly challenging?

Hanna: My experience was a really rewarding one. What I enjoyed most was getting to know the company perspective. Taking part in this challenge offered me the opportunity to learn about the challenges and specific problems companies from different sectors face. As students, we oftentimes have a very different perspective, so this experience enabled me to open up to the company perspective and understand much better why companies set the priorities they do in certain areas. In my case, coming from engineering, I also enjoyed getting to know and learn from companies I wouldn’t usually meet with.

All in all, it was great to interact directly with the company employees and discuss our ideas with them. One big learning I take from these discussions and the feedback we received is that it is highly important to integrate your stakeholders at all times. This is something we didn’t consider much during the challenge, but which is important when developing new business ideas and models.

“Our different student backgrounds definetely contributed to the fact that we were able to forge an innovative idea in just under two days.” – Hanna Zanatta

The challenge spanned two days, which I thought was ideal – short enough to keep the competitive character and drive creativity in a high-pressure environment, but with more time for learning and reflection. I had participated in other challenges before, which only lasted a few hours. In comparison to these shorter challenges, the students had time to get to know each other well, which helped us feel more comfortable around each other and express our opinions freely. This way, we could dive much deeper into the challenge provided to us. Of course, this also left much more room for discussion with the company representatives as well as the academic staff involved, which was great.

Whom would you recommend to take part in this kind of challenge and why?

Hanna: I highly recommend this course to other students, especially if they are up for an extra-curricular activity where they get to learn about the real-life challenges the corporate world is facing today. It’s also a great opportunity to get to know companies outside of your field of study which can really broaden your horizon and even help you discover new areas of interest!