12 November 2018 – A team of five Master of Science in Business Analytics (MSBA) students and one undergraduate Business Analytics student won first place at the Chengdu 80 competition on 4 November in Chengdu, China.
MSBA students Shivam Bansal, Yi Suqin, Ganeshkumar Sundararaj, Steven Tseng, He Shiyuan, and second year Business Analytics student Sung Zheng Jie, beat seven other teams in the financial technology (FinTech) design and development competition and won a cash prize of RMB 40,000.
The competition is part of the Southwestern University of Finance and Economics (SWUFE) and the Consortium for Data Analytics in Risk (CDAR) annual conference. Teams of six students were challenged to build a personal Initial Public Offering (IPO) platform for individuals to list themselves as investment opportunities and to connect investors to these individuals. Teams had to include a pricing analytics model and matching algorithm to their prototype and were judged on seven categories – user interface, user experience, system architecture, creative elements, presentation delivery, feature enrichment, and analytics.
“We developed a prototype that has a seamless, intelligent, and smart interface for both investors and individual issuers,” said Shivam, on behalf of his team. “We integrated deep-analytical techniques mixed with financial models to estimate share prices, and a content-based matching algorithm to help investors find the right individuals to invest in. We also included a simulation playground for investors to compare the characteristics of different individuals.”
Despite having to work continuously for 80 hours, the team managed to pull through and even included extra features to their prototype, such as a smart transaction matching algorithm and a secure decentralised blockchain based payment system. Their prototype also had a robust system architecture and a stable backend system designed for scalability, maintainability, reproducibility, and security. These features gave the team an edge over their international competitors from University of California, Berkeley, Georgia Institute of Technology, Peking University, Tsinghua University, University of Hong Kong, and SWUFE.
“When we learnt about the results, we were extremely excited and could not believe that we won. We are thankful for our advisor, Professor James Pang, for his guidance and motivation. His last minute inputs really helped us to plan better and improve our presentation,” said Shivam.
Chengdu 80 is a FinTech Design and Development competition for academic participants utilising open source technology. The competition provides opportunities for students to interact with leading academics in finance and technology, international financial institutions, and government and regulatory leaders. Each participating team consists of up to six students from a single academic institution led by a faculty member or postdoctoral scholar and must include members from both genders and both undergraduate and graduate students.
The SWUFE-CDAR Symposium, organised by the Chengdu Municipal People’s Government and State Street Corporation, was held at the Waldorf Astoria, Chengdu, China, from 2 to 4 November 2018. The conference brings together industry leaders and academics in finance and technology with government leaders to discuss the path of FinTech in driving reform as well as its impact on China’s financial market opening, access, and regulations.
News mention:
Chengdu Hi-Tech Industrial Development Zone, 5 November 2018
