UTokyo Team Wins the 2015 Boeing Business Competition

Since 2012, Boeing Japan has held a so-called "externship" program in which university students can learn about the aerospace industry.

Topics are presented in English and include the industry's environmental impact and sustainability, as well as an introduction to several of the functional units inside Boeing, including: communications, after-market services, technology development, market projection, etc. This year, 4 universities participated in this program: Kanazawa Institute of Technology, Nagoya University, the University of Tokyo and Tohoku University. The program culminated with a competition on October 2nd held at Tohoku University in Sendai.There, each university presented, in English, a business case for an improvement to the aerospace industry. The University of Tokyo team (Aeronautics and Astronautics, Master 2nd: Shingo Konishi, Master 1st grade: Kaito Kato, Genki Matsubara, Hidenobu Matsuki, Tomoya Tanaka, Bachelor 3rd: Tomoyuki Yamazaki, Chemical System Engineering, Master 1st: Menghe Xu, Graduate School of Science, Physics, Master 1st: Yuuki Wada, Collage of Arts and Sciences, Humanities and Social Sciences Bachelor 4th: Shiho Yamada) proposed a pair of ideas that they called, "Internal and External Approaches to Reducing Airline Operating Costs." For the internal approach, they suggested replacing the traditional galleys with an automated vending system. For the external approach, they proposed using a wall-sticking robot to reduce the cost and environmental impact of washing an airplane. The judges seemed to be impressed with the team's thorough cost-benefit analysis and awarded the team first prize.