The video report of last week’s International Case Competition@Maastricht 2012 is now online. Sixty international top talented bachelor’s students from fifteen business schools all over the world met and compete against each other during the third edition of this global event. Get a glimpse behind the scenes and what motivates participants to take part.
http://youtu.be/Q5u663srpTY?hd=1

International Case Competition Maastricht 2012

youtu.be

Today, the 15 participating teams have been given their 24 hours cases,  and their entire day has been devoted to solving it and preparing their presentation of it. This case will largely determine what teams will be the division winners, and will therefore continue to the finals. While the teams were focused on their case, the final two workshops were given, by DHL and APG.

DHL’s workshop was a fitting end to a week filled with corporate events during the International Case Competition in Maastricht. Mrs. Göttlich and Mr. Hoyer, from the DHL Solutions & Innovations department, gave a very interactive workshop on the topic “Urbanization: A logistical challenge” to a group of students, staff and interested business professionals.
A short company presentation provided us with an overview of the current tasks and challenges of the leading logistics company. Especially urbanization and population growth pose economical, environmental and logistical challenges to a city. The DHL city logistics provide customized logistical solutions to carefully selected cities. Within cities such as Istanbul and London, this team examines the situation, identifies current challenges, looks for ways of improvement and searches for capable business partners to work with. Consolidation centers outside the cities are the major tasks of these global initiatives.
Mrs. Göttlich and Mr. Hoyer then placed us into the shoes of a city logistics planner. They introduced us to the project “World Café”, in which we brainstorm on three different questions in small groups and then, after ten minutes, switch the group. The question “How can retailers efficiently improve their last mile logistics?” yielded results ranging from technology-driven innovations, such as 3D-printers, to very efficient ideas, such as cooperation among different stakeholders and reduction in packaging sizes. Besides making use of the public metro system, students working on the question “How could local governments create incentives for stakeholders to promote the use of last-mile logistics solutions?” thought of efficient tax breaks and penalties for not consolidating. The question “What could be benefits and costs for the urban supply chain when doing consolidation?” was answered with changes being risky – and consequently really costly – on the one hand but ensuring a sustainable environment on the other hand. Other visionary ideas about how to make consolidation even more efficient included ideas of constructing freight lanes, making use of public transport to carry freight and avoiding empty returning trucks by using the space to carry other things e.g. garbage. In the end, the most feasible and realizable solution for further consolidation initiatives we agreed upon was the cooperation of e.g. different stakeholder and logistics companies.
Overall, the workshop gave us a clear overview and made us think about what challenges we and logistics companies have to deal with right now and in the future.

The APG workshop focused on another hot-topic: pensions. What effects do the current trends, such as the ageing population have on APG's asset management and IT infrastructures? For our society's future pensioners this provided a very valuable insight on how companies such as APG operate, as well as how they plan to stay flexible!

On Wednesday the 25th of April during the ICC@M prof. dr. Paul Iske gave a presentation to students and SBE staff about Combinatoric Innovation: Identifying and and Incubating Open Innovations. Paul Iske is professor in Open Innovation and Business Venturing at Maastricht University and is Chief Dialogues Officer at ABN AMRO.

Paul Iske is a very good storyteller, who uses a lot of humour when presenting. During his presentation he explains that people are looking too much inside their company and this is not good for innovation. He also explains that companies have to address all stakeholders and use paradoxes as inspiration for paradigm shifts. For example, he tells that companies can regard their client as employee, which will result in co-creation. Next to this, he states that companies need combinatoric innovation to get access to different perspectives, which gives a larger space for solving problems and identifying new opportunities.
In 2007 he proposed to the board of ABN AMRO to develop the Dialogues House. In this facility, internal and external parties are invited to meet, so creativity, innovation and sustainability will be fostered.  He also introduced the Institute of Brilliant Failures, a movement and website to raise awareness for the fact that innovation can fail and that one can learn from failures.

The attendees were very enthusiastic about the presentation and I would like to thank Paul Iske in name of the corporate event committee for the inspiring presentation.

The second round of 3 hour cases was also today, and the results can be found here. The participants' response: another well-written, clear, and challenging case! With the two three hours cases done, 40% of every team's final score is known. Thursday/Friday's 24 hour case weighs for another 60% though, so it is still anyone's game!

The hard-working participants started working on their case early in the morning, but they weren't the first ones about. The many volunteers were already preparing everything so that their presentations would run as smoothly as possible. The competition took place at School of Business and Economics lecture rooms. Judged by professors, company managers, and other officials, an intensive competition finished with cheers at Ad Fundum, when Bas van Diepen announced the score for every team (the results can be found here).

Parallel to the competition, workshops from Océ / Document Services Valley were happening upstairs in the same building (for more information, please visit http://iccmaastricht.virb.com/workshop-document-services-valley).  Document Services Valley operates as a genuine platform for business services innovation in information-intensive environments at the crossroads of entrepreneurship, IT, technological innovation, and venturing and new business model development. The platform is committed to understanding and extending document services innovation particularly through open innovation.

But today was only the first round of ICC@M 2012, the second round of the competition will be tomorrow, when the participants will yet again be provided with a business case to solve!

ICC@M 2012 has officially and successfully been opened today at Hotel l'Empereur, and while many of the participants are still enjoying our first social event, the competition is ready to begin!

The competition rounds will start on Tuesday, with tomorrow free to discover Maastricht!

Dear Teams!

You are able to find your scores of the two previous cases here

We wish you a lot of succes with the 24 hour case!

IT & Communications

A new day has come! The day starts with a host shopping tour: Energy drinks, bananas, chocolate, coke, chewing gum and water is carried in huge quantities to the car- already preparing for the big 24 –hours-case waiting for the teams tomorrow. After a very successful first day in the “late riser”- group, my team today belongs to the “early-bird-timeslot”, so that I already have to collect their case at 11 a.m.! The today’s case deals with the Amrath Grand Hotel de l’Empereur, the current residence of the teams. It seems like the whole “case competition world” is rushing, but my team seems pretty unimpressed by the entire hectic pace. Another spectacular ride through the city of Maastricht- the city that’s definitely not made for buses. We arrive at the SBE faculty in time and follow the usual procedure: breakout room, presentation, Q+A, lunch, feedback. Although as a host I am more an outsider compared to the participating teams, I do not feel like this while watching the presentation… I find myself sitting in the presentation room excited and being thrilled during each word that is said. Unfortunately my team only achieved the last place in their division today- a huge contrast after being ranked first yesterday. However, winning and losing both are part of the competition. Professional as usually my team is dealing with the disappointment without losing the smiles on their faces. I am convinced that tomorrow and the day after tomorrow will be better days for my team. After the official case program, the team is spending some free time in the city- enjoying the sun, food & probably the best ice-cream in town (all flavors have to be tried until the departure)! I also do need some time to rest- my feet are hurting, my body yearns for some sleep and the BIG day is about to start! Last but not least I have to admit…the spirit of the case competition… it got me!

Tick Tick Tick! The clock tells that it is time to start the event. After the long and exhausting journey this years participants arrived safely in the heart of Europe. Yesterday evening at the Grand Hotel de l'Empereur was the startup of the event which will captivate many young minds this week.

Dear participants, volunteers, and followers!

ICC@M 2011 is getting closer and closer, in less than a week's time it's about to start!

In the meantime we would like to draw your attention to the corporate events that are offered to you by Procter & Gamble and ABN Amro. If you're interested, feel free to sign up. The deadline for the Procter & Gamble workshop has been extended and is still open for subscription.

We're looking forward to seeing you next week!

ICC@M 2011
IT/Communications

Dear participants of ICC@M 2011!

You are now able to download the welcome booklet of this year's case competition held by the School of Business & Economics (SBE) of Maastricht University. You are able to find it under ICC@M 2011.

The welcome booklet contains important information such as the Schedule, Case Competition Rules, General Procedure, and many other things. Ofcourse, you will also be able to find these items within a few days on our website! They will then be provided under the heading 'Competition'.

Cheers,

ICC@M 2011
IT & Communications

The International Case Competition is coming closer and closer...

Within two weeks we will be able to welcome you to the Netherlands, hopefully with great weather. The last days and perhaps even weeks, we have been enjoying the lovely sunshine here in Maastricht, reaching temperatures of 20/68 degrees Celsius/Fahrenheit and even higher!

BTW, you are now also able to contact your teamhosts via their respective email addresses. You can find them under ICC@M/Team Hosts. 

Keep you posted!

ICC@M 2011

Participants, you will now be able to find out who will be your team host during your stay here in Maastricht. You will be able to find the list under ICC@M...

More contact details will follow!

Newly added to the website are the Corporate Events, organized by ICC@M-2011. Two workshops will be provided by Procter & Gamble and ABN Amro Dialogues Incubators respectively. Interested? Find out more information under the tab 'Corporate Events'!

Dear participants and advisors of ICC@M-2011,

In approximately 6 weeks the second edition of ICC@M will start. The organizing committee and all volunteers are extremely excited about this year’s edition and we are busy finalizing the program.

We would like to inform you about a significant change in the ICC@M program. The first 3-hour case will be on Tuesday, the second 3 hour case on Wednesday and the third (24 hour preparation) case will be handed out on Thursday (with presentations and finals on Friday). Accordingly, we shall be able to limit the consequences of jetlags for the participants during the competition. We have experienced an incident with one of our SBE-team members recently and we want to avoid anything alike with our guests.

Currently, we need your individual registration. We have an on-line registration system for each participant to register. We need your individual registration Friday April 8^th. The link is:

http://iccmaastricht.virb.com/registration-procedure

(Having trouble opening the page? Copy this URL into your browser.)

Furthermore, we will be conducting a T-Shirt exchange, so please bring 4-5 T-Shirts from your University to exchange.

We are looking forward to meeting all of you. 

Kind regards on behalf of all involved in ICC@M-2011

Its hard to tell how many volunteers and little helpers we need but many are knocking at our doors. If you wanna be part of it, just register here.

It becomes hot in the media world with web2.0 leaving no space to breath. So we thought that it might be a good idea to start also a Facebook group and disseminate our info via Twitter. After all, its cool!

The registration form is now online and besides some additional information everything looks good. Now we are waiting to see how many people register! Will you be the first?

Hi everybody! We are launching our website for the upcoming ICC here in Maastricht soon. So stay tuned. The registration will also be open in a few days. The weather here is good and we are busy preparing for the start.