A4S Global Competition Update: Leeds students are heading to Canada!

This year, thirty Leeds University Business School students stepped up to tackle one of the biggest global challenges of our time – sustainable finance – through their participation in the A4S International Case Competition.

Organised by the Accounting for Sustainability (A4S) initiative, founded by HRH The Prince of Wales, the competition invites student teams from universities across the world to develop finance-driven, practical solutions to real-life sustainability problems. With around 80 teams entering the competition globally, it’s an incredible platform for students to stretch their thinking, apply their learning, and contribute to a better future.

A celebration of student talent and commitment

At LUBS, six teams took their ideas through to submission – a brilliant achievement given the tight timescales and demanding brief. Throughout the process, students showed creativity, professionalism, and a willingness to take on complex sustainability challenges, all while balancing academic commitments.

As part of the celebration event held on campus, students were thanked for their dedication and encouraged to reflect on the employability and life skills they developed. Whether or not their ideas progressed to the next stage, each participant has gained valuable experience in teamwork, problem-solving, communication, and strategic thinking – key skills that employers value highly. Students also received advice on how to translate this experience into strong CV statements and how to showcase their involvement on LinkedIn.

A global journey for Team Refrigenius

Among the five Leeds teams, Team Refrigenius saw their idea progress through the semi-final stage and were selected to attend the in-person finals in Toronto on 3–4 April 2025. Their video entry and solution impressed the international judging panel and their consistent engagement – including attending every available briefing – played a big part in their success. You can watch their video here​!

A supportive community and shared success

At the celebration event, Professor Iain Clacher (Pro Dean International) offered his congratulations to all students who submitted entries, highlighting the commitment and innovation shown across the board. He also shared a special mention for the Refrigenius team’s trailer video which so skillfully highlighted the commercial value of the insights and proposed solutions. Huge thanks went out to Academic Lead Jo Cutter and wonderful staff members , Andrea Denny, Elena Karali, Amanda Sivan Kaufman Beech, Warren Mauron, Sally Chan and Jyoti Mishra for their hard work in supporting the competition through diligent planning, workshopping and submissions review. Staff and student partnership working at its absolute best!

Looking ahead

Huge congratulations to every student who took part. Your efforts have demonstrated not only your passion for sustainable business but your willingness to engage with global challenges – a mindset that will serve you well far beyond your time at Leeds!

Our A4S Students

Team 1

• Hepzibah Akalawu-Ellman
• Hiransh Depura
• Mustafa Ali
• Sara Pandey
• Sonal Kukreja

Team 3

• Hadia Arain
• Jackson Mathew
• Arjun Rajasekharan

Team 12

• Thi Tuyet Mai Nguyen
• Ting Yu Kao
• Yeh Yu Tung
• Yuxiao Chi

Team 14 – RefriGenius

• Amane Yoshihara
• Han-Sheng Chen
• Yi-Chin Yang
• Jo-En Wang
• Weijian Zhu

Team 18

• Ibrahim Al Qada
• Izzat Ariqat
• Mukul Rao
• Shashank Ravishankar

Team 19

• Cheng-Han Chien
• HoJung Chen
• Teng-Chih Ting
• Wei-Yi Tsai

Good luck to Team Refrigenius in Toronto – and well done to all our fantastic teams for representing LUBS on the global stage!