On 3rd March 2022, Keyloop, the global automotive technology company, announced the individual university winners of the second annual Keyloop Dealer Tech competition. Over 1,000 students from leading universities registered their interest in the competition.

4 students; Barnaby Gill, Ryan Storey, Oskar Oramus and Isaac Cheng from The University of Exeter formed the team ‘ExeTerminators’. Their idea was to create a web application that provides insights into people's travel habits including suggestions to reduce the environmental impact.

The ExeTerminators commented: “We found out about the Keyloop Dealer Tech competition through our student startup community manager at the University of Exeter. We saw an opportunity to develop a solution that would help people’s everyday lives. After looking at the existing solutions on the market, we identified a gap in the market to target our idea towards. The competition has been a great experience for us to develop a project from the ground up. Pitching to the Keyloop Dealer Tech judges encouraged us to practice our presentation and public speaking skills. We had to consider all aspects of our project like the target audience, leading competitors, and commercial business case.”

Following several university judging days over the past three weeks, six finalists have been selected from the university winners to progress to the international final, where they will compete to win the £10,000 prize (or local currency equivalent).  

The six grand finalists are:

• King’s College London, team: Christian Grinling
• The University of Manitoba, team: EasyCar
• The University of Exeter, team: ExeTerminators
• The University of Bath, team: Tom Christensen
• The University of Warwick, team: The Testroyers
• Munster Technological University, team: REVVV

The Keyloop Dealer Tech competition provides an opportunity for students to team up with their friends, network with industry professionals, gain new skills and win big prizes. The initiative was founded by Keyloop in 2021 to encourage innovation in automotive retail amongst the next generation of car buyers, and to promote the industry as an exciting and dynamic career choice for students.The 2022 competition was open to teams from leading universities across the UK, Ireland and Canada, and has unearthed some strong STEM and business talent, as demonstrated by the quality of the final presentations. 

Tom Kilroy, CEO, Keyloop comments:

“We created the Keyloop Dealer Tech competition to nurture new talent and encourage them to discover the great career possibilities which exist within the automotive retail industry. In 2022 the competition equipped all our entries with new skills and experiences to help them succeed in the competitive graduate employment space. We have provided masterclasses and mentorship in business strategy, product design and development and in return we are seeing some truly ground-breaking ideas that could have a very positive impact on the way consumers buy, service or use cars."

This year’s competition saw each student team tasked with developing an innovative tech-focused product idea that could make an impact on the automotive retail industry. The 30 successful proposals progressed to the ‘Idea development phase’, during which students built out their proposals into product ideas, with the help of industry experts, learning materials and mentors.

They were then asked to present their ideas to a panel of expert judges at Keyloop.  The presentations were done in professional settings and included a demonstration of the product, plus a Q&A to mirror a real-world pitch scenario.

The top-scoring team from each university receives £1,000. Details of all winners can be found below. From all the universities, the six best entries will progress to the grand final, where teams will get the opportunity to present their ideas on 9^th March to the full judging panel of Senior Keyloop Leaders and industry experts, where an overall winner will be selected, and receive a further £10,000.

Michelle Wells, Director Brand Strategy and Corporate Communications, Keyloop ends:

“The Keyloop Dealer Tech Competition provides an opportunity for undergraduates to gain first-hand experience of industry challenges, current technology trends and entrepreneurship. It is also an opportunity for them to gain valuable experience with a global automotive technology company that strives to support their future job aspirations. My congratulations go to all the university winners so far for their game-changing ideas, and I look forward to congratulating the international winner.”

Find out more about the competition at: http://www.keyloop.co.uk/dealertech/index.html