St James School at Astellas Innovation Challenge Final

Rachel Riley – TV presenter and Oxford Maths graduate – proudly announced the victors of the inaugural Astellas Innovation Challenge and awarded prizes for first, second and third place winners alongside competition ambassador and host Dr Kevin Fong and Astellas CEO, Ken Jones.

The competition asked students aged 14-16 to design a mobile app to encourage healthy living, with an aim to increase interest amongst school students in taking up Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) subjects at university and beyond.

The winners, from St Paul’s Catholic College, in West Sussex, South East England, claimed victory with an impressive idea designed to support mental wellbeing through storing individual’s favourite photos and positive memories in one place. The team will now see if their innovative thinking can contribute to improving the health of the nation, as their mobile app is brought to reality by professional developers and made available for free download by the UK public.

A total of eleven teams, who excelled over entrants from across the UK, were invited to present their health app ideas to a panel of expert judges, including campaign ambassador Rachel Riley, Astellas CEO Ken Jones and experts in app development, education, science and healthcare at the Royal Institution in London on 25 November. 

“The quality of entries for the Astellas Innovation Challenge was outstanding.

Each team showed great awareness of real challenges to healthy living and true creativity in utilising mobile technology and innovation to create solutions,” said Rachel Riley, TV presenter and ambassador to the Astellas Innovation Challenge.  She continued: “Mobile apps are transforming the way we manage our health and how healthcare is provided. Through this competition we have seen school students make some incredible applications of STEM skills to encourage healthier lifestyles and I hope this illustrates the variety of career pathways STEM studies can enable.”

Highlighting the need for initiatives to empower young people to engage with STEM subjects is recent YouGov research conducted amongst British 11 – 16 year olds. The research revealed that British school children have high aspirations to be innovative, 33% said they would like to one day own their own business and 31% said they would like to have a job focused on coming up with new ideas and developing new technologies. The Astellas Innovation Challenge has provided a platform to support 14-16 year olds to connect with STEM subjects in a new and engaging way.

“As an organisation employing people with a range of STEM expertise, Astellas knows exactly how important these subjects are and we are proud to organise and fund initiatives like the Astellas Innovation Challenge,” said Ken Jones, President and CEO of Astellas Pharma EMEA. “We are very excited by the potential of the winning app to encourage healthy living in the UK and it is our hope that all the talented young innovators who entered the competition are inspired to continue developing their STEM abilities into the future. These skills can open doors to a wealth of exciting careers and are key to the future of the UK’s thriving knowledge-based economy.” 

Dr Kevin Fong said, “I have first-hand experience of how exciting and rewarding a career in science can be and that is something I’m very keen to pass on to the next generation of innovators and scientific pioneers. Seeing the enthusiasm and creativity of the finalists today has been inspiring and filled me with optimism for the future of science and technology in the UK.”

In addition to taking the top spot, members of the team from St Paul’s Catholic College will each receive an iPod Touch and an educational grant of £1,800 to invest in STEM subjects at their school. Kesteven and Sleaford High School Selective Academy, East Midlands, which came second in the competition with an app called Stress Genie, designed to alleviate stress and provide coping mechanisms to deal with stress, will receive an educational grant of £1,000 and an iPod Touch for each team member. Third placed, The Liverpool Blue Coat School in the North West – whose app, called AmiGO! is designed to encourage young people to keep fit, have also been awarded an educational grant of £250 for their school.

Astellas is committed to improving lives by providing innovative medicines in areas of health where there is great unmet medical need and also in supporting people for a healthy future.