19 March, 2021

On the 19th of March, MTU’s Hincks Centre for Entrepreneurship Excellence and School of Business held the final of the annual APPrentice competition. While the competition has been running for several years, this was the very first time the event (like many others) was run virtually.

The APPrentice competition aims to encourage students to flex their creativity in coming up with new and innovative app ideas ranging from areas such as education and entertainment to those with a social entrepreneurship orientation and, while sharing their ideas, be in with the chance of winning prizes for their efforts.

We had almost 100 submissions from students from all faculties, disciplines, and campuses across MTU. It was great to see an increase in the number of submissions from QQI students from Cork College Progression Scheme. It was a tough job to whittle them down to a final 18, as the quality of submissions this year was phenomenal.

The APP idea finalists worked with 2nd year BBAdmin students to design posters to represent their APP idea. Thank you for your support to lecturers Orla Cartner, Mary Oldham and Finbarr Sheehan who use the competition as part of their modules' continuous assessment.

Thank you to Angela O Connell, Foróige and Fernando Campayo Sanchez, University of Alicante, Spain who judged the APP ideas. Thank you to Katy Graepel, Marketing Manager, Graepel Perforators and Weavers Ltd. for joining us again this year to judge the posters. 

The winners were announced by Breda Kenny, Head of School of Business MTU Cork.

APP winners

• Best APP Idea - Positive Plates: Kyle Byrne, Electronic Engineering;
• APP Idea Runner Up - Safe Spaces: Alana Neenan, International Business;
• APP Special Award - Loco Click ‘n’ Collect: Josh Hurley Wilkinson, Business Information Systems;

Poster winners

• Best Poster - Charitease: Katelyn O'Sullivan and Emma Kelleher

• Poster Runner Up - Dog Poop Tracker: Joseph Hallahan, Sean Horan and Patrick Dunlea.

All posters for this year's competition can be viewed by clicking here.

More information about this fantastic competition is available by clicking here.