March 19, 2019. Shanghai – CCTV-2’s renowned We are the Hero programme travelled to CEIBS Shanghai campus to launch an entrepreneurship roadshow together with CEIBS eLab. This first-ever collaboration between China’s “dream accelerator” and Asia’s No.1 business school attracted attention from around many regions and industries.

Ten start-up teams from the fields of education, healthcare, sustainability, and travel gathered at CEIBS to present their entrepreneurship projects to a panel of eight judges, including We are the Hero producer Run Qiong, directors Xie Xin Ruei and Zhao Shan Shan, and Mytech China co-Founder and Shanghai Venture Capital Association Vice President Yu Jiang Hong, as well as past China Entrepreneurship Award winners Wang Yu, Bi Xin, and Cheng Shu.

The roadshow kicked off with a speech by Director of CEIBS eLab Professor Vincent Chang, who gave much credit to both the CCTV team and EMBA 2016 alum Yu Jiang Hong for giving CEIBS startups the chance to demonstrate their creativity and entrepreneurial spirit on stage. After ten rounds of pitching and Q&A sessions, the judges anonymously voted for four final round candidates. We are the Hero producer Run Qiong then announced teams “Zhi,” “One Drama,” “Bollins,” and “AI-toy” as the finalists.

First-place winner “Zhi” was incubated at CEIBS eLab in 2016. With more than 15 years of textiles industry experience, founder Kathy Fu and her team spent four years developing a zero waste production system and an innovative knitwear fabric that addresses a traditional pain point of short life cycle products and promotes sustainability. The company also created a high tech barrier for competitors and proactively engaged B2B and B2C partners in the same ecosystem, including ecommerce channels and designer artists.

Runner-up “One Drama” hit a sweet spot in both drama and education. The company covers kindergarten theatre training and commercial performances at the same time. Third-place winner “Bollins” owns patents and medical licenses that support their unique positioning as a “personal health consultant” brand. Last but not least, “AI-toy” impressed the audience with their cross-over between an AI platform and the toy industry to create futuristic user scenarios.

According to the programme’s coordinator, the four final teams will get the opportunity to pitch their ideas to investors and entrepreneurship mentors on  We are the Hero, and to fight for a chance to realise their start-up dreams.