On October 21, the 3rd New Business Competition for Higher Educations in Gansu Province (hereafter as the Competition) was held in Lanzhou University. The competition was sponsored by Gansu Provincial Department of Education, organized by Lanzhou University, and guided by Gansu Provincial Committee of Teaching Guidance, Accreditation and Textbook Construction of Management Undergraduate Programs, with technical support from Guangzhou First Technology Co., Ltd.(hereafter as First Company), and LZU Enterprise Innovation Research Center, and co-organized by Lanzhou New Area Commerce Trade and Logistics Investment Co., Ltd., and Enterprise Innovation and Development Institute of Gansu Province. During the competition, the New Business Programs Construction Seminar was also held. The competition attracted registrations from 40 teams of undergraduate students, 12 teams of graduate students, and 27 teams of senior students representing 32 higher institutions in Gansu Province.

The opening ceremony of the competition was held at 9:00 a.m. Gou Xiaohua, Vice President of LZU, Zhang Hongwei, Chief of Higher Education Division of Gansu Provincial Department of Education, some members of Gansu Provincial Committee of Teaching Guidance, Accreditation and Textbook Construction of Management Undergraduate Programs, heads of the business colleges across the province, leaders of the supportive and co-sponsoring units of the competition, as well as all the participating teachers and students attended the opening ceremony. The ceremony was presided over by Zhao Yanhai, Associate Dean of LUSM.

On behalf of LZU, Gou Xiaohua delivered a speech. She pointed out that “New Business” facilitates the reorganization and intersection of traditional business disciplines, seamlessly integrates cutting-edge technologies into business courses, and offers students a comprehensive interdisciplinary education encompassing novel concepts, modes, and methods. The competition has effectively established a platform for promoting the integration of industry, university, research institutions, government and enterprises while fostering the advancement of new business education in Gansu Province. LZU will be guided by the principles of digital education innovation and business education reform, while addressing the practical challenges in developing and constructing new business talent cultivation in Gansu Province. The university will continuously innovate the educational model, integrate resources, optimize curriculum systems, explore a new paradigm for cultivating business talents with LZU’s unique characteristics, and establish a digitized business talent cultivation system. The aim is to promote high-quality and comprehensive development of professional education in the field of business within the province.

On behalf of Gansu Provincial Department of Education, Zhang Hongwei welcomed the teachers and students of the participating universities and expressed his gratitude to the teachers and students of LZU who worked hard to prepare for the competition and to Guangzhou First Technology Co., Ltd. He pointed out that the competition, as a provincial discipline and specialty competition, is based on the new education concept. Its objective is to foster students’ comprehensive development, reconsider and devise a novel talent cultivation model, and strive to nurture innovative business talents urgently required in the digital economy era. He proposed three aspirations for the competition: to enhance the quality of teaching level through the competition, so as to promote the overall improvement of talent training quality; to utilize the competition to cultivate patriotism of the students; with the help of competition to promote innovation and drive the combination of Industry-college-institute Cooperation.

Yang Fan, general manager of Guangzhou First Technology Co., Ltd. delivered a speech on behalf of the technical support unit of the competition. He said that the successful holding of the competition is attributed to the collaborative efforts of the organizers and participating institutions. As a technical support unit, we are committed to constructing a platform for the competition, ensuring orderly proceedings and safeguarding the entire process through complete technical support, thus guaranteeing its success.

Liu Yajun, Secretary of LUSM CPC Committee, delivered a speech on behalf of the School. He briefly introduced the basic situation and development achievements of LUSM. He said that business education in higher institutions in the new era should vigorously promote the application of modern technologies such as big data, artificial intelligence, virtual reality and other modern technologies in teaching and management, intensify the reform efforts in the aspects of talent cultivation objectives, teaching concepts, teaching modes, and curriculum systems, explore the implementation of networked, digitized, intelligent, and personalized business education, and cultivate comprehensive business talents with high digital literacy.

After the opening ceremony, the participating teams, according to the basic information of the enterprise and relevant task instructions provided by the competition platform, completed the analysis of the enterprise’s market environment, user analysis, digital product selection, business target planning, e-commerce operation, goods storage and distribution, customer relationship management, overall operation analysis, capital situation analysis, prospect analysis and other skills competition contents by applying the digital tools in accordance with their respective roles, responsibilities and tasks. All participating students calmly and confidently played their roles in the test. 

Two parallel seminars were also held during the competition. Invited guests from undergraduate colleges and higher vocational colleges had in-depth discussions and exchanges on the themes of “Comprehensively Improving the Quality of Independent Cultivation of Talents and the Construction of First-class Programs” and “High-quality Development of Business Programs in Vocational Colleges” respectively. The seminar consisted of keynote speeches and free exchanges. Several invited guests made keynote speeches, including Dong Qing, Dean of Business School, Northwest Normal University; Mo Junwen, Dean of School of Economics & Management, Lanzhou Jiaotong University; Li Yabing, Dean of School of Economics and Management, Lanzhou University of Technology; Hao Jinlei, Dean of School of Business Administration, Lanzhou University of Finance and Economics; Yang Hu, Dean of School of Economics and Management, Hexi University; Zheng Gang, LUSM’s Director of Department of Organization and Management; Liu Zhi, Party branch Secretary and Dean of the School of Economics and Management of Gansu Industry Polytechnic College; Chen Juan, Associate Dean of the School of Economics and Management of Gansu Finance and Trade Professional College; and the leaders of Guangzhou First Technology Co., Ltd. By focusing on the topic of discussion and integrating exploration and practice, the participants reached a consensus on three key areas: transforming the new business education model, establishing a synergistic mechanism for industry-education integration, and enhancing the independent cultivation capacity of talents in colleges and universities. This collaborative effort has paved the way for implementing innovative developments in business education in Gansu Province.

The closing ceremony of the competition was held at 15:00 pm. Then, Mai Quanfa, deputy general manager of First Company, summarized the competition. On the basis of the participant’s general performance, he affirmed the knowledge reserve and professional skills they showed during the competition, while analyzing their weaknesses reflected in the process of answering the questions.

Zhao Yanhai, Associate Dean of LUSM, reported the results of the thematic seminar from three aspects: the exploratory practices of new business talent education in the context of the new era, the consensus reached by the guests and the direction of future efforts.

Liu Yajun announced the list of winners. After automatic scoring by the system, review by the staff and public announcement of the results, 31 teams were honored as the final winners, including 4 first prizes, 4 second prizes and 8 third prizes in the undergraduate group; 1 first prize, 1 second prize and 2 third prizes in the postgraduate group; 3 first prizes, 3 second prizes and 5 third prizes in the higher vocational group. The 16 instructors of the first prize teams in each category were awarded the prize of “Excellent Instructor”. 

The Competition was launched on August 1, 2023 and is divided into two rounds: the internal preliminary round and the provincial final round. The competition has three groups: postgraduate group, undergraduate group and higher vocational group. The competition content consists of three parts: digital operation, supply chain management and management accounting, and the competition duration is 2 hours. The final competition is a team competition, in which teams are formed by schools, and each university can form up to two teams in each group. The competition has received wide attention and active participation from colleges and universities in the province. 79 teams from 32 colleges and universities in the province, including Lanzhou University, Northwest Normal University, Lanzhou University of Technology, Lanzhou Jiaotong University, Gansu Agricultural University, Northwest Minzu University, Gansu University of Political Science and Law, Gansu University of Chinese Medicine, Lanzhou University of Finance and Economics, and Gansu Finance and Trade Professional College, have registered for the competition, with 237 students and 118 instructors. The number of participating colleges and universities and the number of students reaching the highest number of participants in the history of the competition.