Youssra Raihani and Abdelhakim Allalou are the winners of the 4th Edition of the “Start Cup Competition” held last March 16th, 2023 at the University of Granada, during the UNIMED General Assembly.
Youssra and Abdelhakim are students at the National School of Applied Sciences of the University Ibn Tofail of Kenitra, Morocco and they have presented the project SHAMS.
“The project SHAMS concerns a sustainable solution and our mission as engineers is to create solutions for people who are in need around the world. We are very happy to be the winners of this competition.
In this competition we have met many colleagues from other Mediterranean countries. All the ideas were good and valuable and all the competitors are successful students. Besides having been awarded, from this competition we will take home new friendships and contacts”, said Youssra.
We asked Abdelhakim to explain in a few words their project “SHAMS concerns a tank, a solar water heater, that helps people who are suffering from the lack of access to safe hot water. This tank has pipes outside on the four sides that are projected into the sun and that are covered by plastic bottles. For this aspect the project also helps the environmental impact of the plastic as it uses recycled materials. The bottles create a greenhouse effect that makes the pipes hot and the water starts to circulate through the pipes and then goes back to the tank. In one hour and a half of this process we can have the water from 40° to 60°, depending on the external temperature”.
The project SHAMS took less than one year of work and as said by Youssra “we will continue to improve our project and spread our help to ensure safe hot water to all the people in need not only in Morocco”.
During the 4th Edition of the Start Cup Competition several teams coming from the UNIMED associated Universities presented innovative entrepreneurial ideas from a podcast about sustainable diets to inspire and guide people interested in making their food more sustainable to changing food waste to compost or biogas by having factory or simply a device used in home or producing 100% recyclable filaments as materials for 3D printer and high quality and low costs 3D printers as well as after sale services. These are only some of the best business ideas that were selected for this 4th edition at the University of Granada: students do pay lots of attention to environmental sustainability and to a more sustainable economic and social development.
A gallery of the event is available at this link