Prague, 4 June 2024: A team of students from the Anglo-American University (AAU) in Prague has won first place in the Top JA Start-up 2024 business ideas competition with its travel app DIVEIN. This achievement marks the second win in a row for the Business Administration students and is a testament to the quality of practical teaching at AAU. The team will represent the Czech Republic at the European finals in Catania, Sicily this July. The app provides travelers with personalized recommendations for an authentic travel experience.
DIVEIN is a start-up company founded by AAU students. DIVEIN has developed a travel app of the same name. It offers users a travel itinerary that provides authenticated information to the chosen destination, avoiding the shortcomings that arise when using artificial intelligence to create itineraries.
The DIVEIN app has already started to generate interest in the industry. The team behind its development will present its product to the management of Škoda Auto a.s. in June. A meeting with AAU investor and founder Martin Kúšik is also planned.
The repeated success of AAU can be attributed, among other things, to the Entrepreneurship in Practice course that all members of the DIVEIN team have taken. The course, led at AAU by mentors Heinrich Homola and Jeff Medeiros, covers all essential aspects of entrepreneurship, guiding students through the process of developing a business from conception to implementation, and culminating in the Top JA Start-up competition at the end of the school year.
“The course was very practical. We learned a lot about how to market our product, create a plan and find developers. I think we all enjoyed it and will draw from it in our future careers,” said DIVEIN CEO Daryna Senergei about the experience of the course taught at AAU.
The DIVEIN team, consisting of Alisa Safarian, Cassidy Karbowski, Daryna Semergei, Diego Castro Lopez and Isabella Agnes Vesper, will compete in the Innovation of the Year and Start-up of the Year competitions at the JA Europe finals, part of the Gen-E European Festival of Entrepreneurship.
The JA Start-Up programme is an entrepreneurial education programme of JA Czech and JA Europe, which is simultaneously implemented at 300 universities across Europe with the participation of more than 15,000 students. The programme gives students aged 18-30 the opportunity to develop their own business idea and helps them to apply their skills in different areas of entrepreneurship. Students form teams and work for 1-2 semesters to develop a business idea with the support of mentors. While the Top JA Start-up competition has existed at the high school level since the 1990s, it is only since the last academic year that universities have been able to apply for their own competition.
AAU
Anglo-American University, was founded in 1990, making it the oldest private university with an English degree program in the country. In its fields of study (economics and management, law, international relations and diplomacy, humanities, journalism and visual arts), it offers students an education in accordance with American educational standards in small, interactive study groups.
AAU was the first European educational institution to receive the prestigious US accreditation from WSCUC in 2016, which accredits such renowned universities as Stanford University, University of California, Berkeley, and Chapman University, with which AAU offers a joint MBA program.
