Three groups of graduate students in the Division of Mechanical and Systems Engineering, Graduate School of Natural Science and Technology, Okayama University received the Excellence Award (Energia Chugoku Electric Power Co. Award), the Special Award (Director General of the Chugoku Headquarters of the Small and Medium Enterprise Corporation Award), and the Encouragement Award, respectively, at the "2022 Campus Venture Grand Prix Chugoku Tournament", a competition known as a gateway to success for student entrepreneurs. The Excellence Award went to the group of SHIMAZAKI Kazuma and YAMAGATA Mitsuki (first-year master's students) of the Graduate School of Natural Science and Technology for their "Semiplastic Items". The special prize went to the group of KAWABE Tomoya, KURAKADO Hidefumi, and OHYAMA Yushi (1st year) for the "Collaborative Research Matching Service 'Co×Labo' through Industry-Academia-Private Collaboration”. The Encouragement Award went to the group of EZAKI Yusuke, MIYAZATO Kosuke, and TAN LI QI (first-year students) for their "Travel Planning Optimization Application (Toripuran)”. The award ceremony was held in Hiroshima on January 19.
The award-winning idea was conceived by a student in a lecture on "Advanced Creative Design," a graduate course in the Division of Mechanical and Systems Engineering, and was submitted to this contest.
The Campus Venture Grand Prix Chugoku Tournament is a business that recruits, screens, and awards business plans for students enrolled in graduate schools, universities, colleges of technology, junior colleges, and vocational schools in the Chugoku region. Despite the coronavirus crisis that continued from last year, there were a total of 119 applications from 16 universities and colleges this year.

[Inquiries regarding this matter]
Graduate School of Natural Science and Technology (Engineering)
Professor OHASHI Kazuhito
TEL: 086-251-8041