The New Nation - Internet Edition

BUSINESS REPORT

The Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation (HSBC) Ltd in Bangladesh held a workshop for the 30 winning teams of the first round of the regional Young Entrepreneur Awards (YEA) 2008 at Brac Center Inn on March 10.

YEA allows talented students to showcase their creativity and aptitude for entrepreneurship. Through the workshop HSBC seeks to provide the students with guidance on how to turn their ideas into a coherent business plan that is capable of receiving bank financing.

The 30 winning teams that were invited to the workshop were selected from over 330 teams that submitted their ideas in the first round. At the workshop, the teams received presentations and guidance from Dr Arif Dowla, Managing Director of ACI Ltd, Syed Munir Khasru of IBA and a variety of HSBC's senior management team including Steve Banner, Mustafa Aolad, Glenn Ashbrooke, Mustafizur R Khan and Sami Hafiz.

The three winning teams from Bangladesh will be sent to Hong Kong where the Gold winner will compete in the regional competition with winners from other competitions held by HSBC in Malaysia, Hong Kong, Thailand, Vietnam, Brunei and Philippines. In addition, the three teams will also be going on a study trip courtesy of HSBC.

Last year, Bangladesh participated in this competition for the first time and the Gold winning team from IBA created history by winning the "Best of the Best" award and a cash prize of Tk 10 lakhs.