Luca Maio and Michele Loschi, students of the University of Trieste, were among the winners of the international project X-Culture 2019 (https://x-culture.org/) and have just returned from the Global Symposium in United States, where the international finals were held at the University of Texas San Antonio. Sixty-one students from the International Marketing course attended the international competition. This competition included 5,412 students from 148 universities in 70 countries from six continents of the world. Each participant was a member of a team made up of students of different nationalities. Each team developed a business plan for the internationalization of an existing company. The Department of Economics, Business, Mathematics and Statistics of the University of Trieste has been promoting and sponsoring this initiative for seven years.
Luca Maio, from Udine, is a student of Luciano Fonda University College, which welcomes deserving students from all over the world who want to study at the University of Trieste. He attends the third year of the bachelor degree in Business and Management and was ranked in the top 4% of 960 teams participating in the international competition. His team was composed of 5 students from the USA, the Caribbean and Colombia. The winning business plan was developed for the start-up "X-Culture Kids, Born Global", with the aim of raising awareness among children in Cuba and the Dominican Republic on multicultural issues, and strengthening their relational and multi-cultural skills. Luca participated in the international finals also thanks to the sponsorship of the Pietro Pittini Foundation. The Pietro Pittini Foundation has as one of its mission objectives to help young people develop their talent, raise their skills, and stimulate business initiatives. Within the framework of Agenda 2030 established by the United Nations, the Pietro Pittini Foundation focused on the Sustainable Development Goals "Quality Education" (n°4), "Good Jobs And Economic Growth" (n°8) and "Industry Innovation and Infrastructure" (n°9).
Michele Loschi, from Modena, attends the third year of the Bachelor Degree in Business and Management and was ranked in the top 5% of more than five thousand students participating in the international competition. The evaluation was based not only on the business plan but also, thanks to a peer-to-peer evaluation, on commitment, leadership, the ability to communicate, the ideas proposed, the interpersonal skills that Michele Loschi demonstrated. With his team of 5 students from the USA, Thailand and Hungary, Michele Loschi presented a business plan for the internationalization of OGG Business Solutions, one of the leading companies in the information technology industry, particularly in business simulation games, well known in Brazil but currently still operating in a local context.
The X-Culture project is part of the internationalization and innovative teaching activities aimed at strengthening the soft skills that differentiate the curricula of students who graduate in the economic and business degree courses of the University of Trieste.
For information: Prof. Donata Vianelli, donata.vianelli@deams.units.it
Department of Economics, Business, Mathematics and Statistics
