New Bitcoin competition prize fund
Competition launched by Business school for blockchain technology development
The Imperial College Business School (ICBS) has teamed up with Entrepreneur First (EF), a pre-seed investment programme, to launch a new competition prize fund for students. Up to £3000 could be won from the Imperial/EF Bitcoin Prize Fund for projects that utilise Blockchain technology, which allows secure transactions without the need for a central regulation authority – how Bitcoin is best described.
The competition is open to entrants from any department, be they Undergraduate or Postgraduate. Students can apply to carry out projects under the fund either individually or as a group, with grants up to £500 available for equipment funding. They can also arrange for projects to count as credit towards degree courses.
Dr Llewellyn Thomas, a researcher with the Business School, has emphasized that the aim of the competition is not the focus of Bitcoin as a currency. Rather, it seeks to promote innovations on Blockchain technology, as the distributed trust mechanism of the Blockchain is the truly innovative aspect of said technology.
This is not Imperial’s first foray into involvement with Bitcoin/Blockchain technology. The recently-launched Bitcoin Forum at Imperial, which consists of faculty members across all departments, will be working with EF to mentor and assist students entering the competition. Workshops on entrepreneurship and presentation skills, regular mixers, and talks from prestigious figures in the Bitcoin and business fields are just a number of things planned by the Forum and EF for those who register to take part. The Forum also hopes to facilitate cross-faculty partnerships throughout the course of this competition.
