On November 11, U of T Engineering students Tarek El Fedawy (IndE 1T3), Kazem Kutob (IndE 1T3), Layan Kutob (IndE 1T2 + PEY) and Alberto Picard-Ami (IndE 1T3) took second place at the Wharton Undergraduate Consulting Competition, beating out teams from Harvard, University of Pennsylvania, New York University and Rutgers.

The Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania is one of the top business schools in North America and the world. This year, the focus of the competition was on “The Aspiring Consultant.”

Teams were required to identify strategies to remediate a global financial service firm’s regulatory and operational deficiencies, while increasing annual revenues 60% by 2015.

The U of T Engineering team proposed strategies that tackled expansions in the global market and revenue streams, as well as new technologies and improvements on the operational system’s efficiencies. Though first place went to Yale, U of T still had an incredible showing.

“It was such an incredible moment of joy to be a finalist and to be awarded second place after competing against some of the world’s most respected and top-rated universities,” said Layan Kutob. “It made us, even more, appreciate the education and extra-curricular exposure that U of T Engineering gives us.”

“On behalf of the Faculty, I would like to congratulate the team on their richly-deserved achievement,” said Dean Cristina Amon. “Their success, among other world-renowned universities, illustrates the strength of our remarkable engineering education with business acumen.”