Introducing the 2025 Launceston Airport Case Challenge winners

A team of Part-Time MBA students who started in April this year have won the 2025 Launceston Airport Case Challenge.

A team of first year Part-Time MBA students have beaten 18 teams to take out this year’s top prize at the Launceston Airport Case Challenge.

The annual case challenge held at Melbourne Business School is a favourite among students and an opportunity to put what they’ve learned in class into practice with a real business case.

This year, students were tasked with answering the following question for Launceston Airport:

“As customer expectations increase, with many airports improving and competing between each other on the customer offer, how far should airports go to “impress” the passenger?”

Five finalists were selected out of 19 submissions to present their case to the panel.

The panel included Melbourne Business School Deputy Dean Tava Olsen, Former Chair of Tourism Victoria and Lifetime Patron of the School John Kennedy, Startup Founder and MBA alum Xue Huang, Launceston Airport Head of Finance and Corporate Services Geoff Duggan and Launceston Airport’s Head of Planning, Development and Customer Ilya Brucksch.

As Ilya called out the winners, he said the high standard of submissions did not make it easy for the judges.

“The judges went through a lot of deliberation to get to this point and we are united in our result, but it did take some time to get there,” he said.

First Prize - The Gateway Group

First prize went to the Gateway Group’s Chris Richardson, Lawrence Huynh and Daniel Duong who impressed the judges with their idea to rebrand Launceston Airport.

Chris, who works in the Fast-Moving Consumer Goods industry, said the team came up with the idea to rename the airport to capitalise on the region’s most iconic attractions after interviewing travellers about why they travelled to Launceston.

“Overwhelmingly they went to Cradle Mountain or Bay of Fires (or both) so the idea came from this insight. We had identified other airports like Busselton Margaret River Airport and Hollywood Burbank Airport who successfully changed their names to leverage local attractions,” Chris said.

The team proposed partnering with local artists to display their artwork and explore a partnership with Hobart’s world-renowned Museum of Old and New Art (MONA).

Lawrence, who works in compliance, also presented an idea to incorporate AI to test and maximise efficiencies such as staffing throughout the airport which would capitalise on Australia’s largest AI-facility being built in Launceston.

Despite only being in the early days of the MBA, Chris said their Business Essentials and Data Analysis classes had proved useful as they had become accustomed in structured thinking and tackling current business problems from the case studies and research methods they were exposed to.

“The experience was challenging but fantastic. The synergy of working with teammates from diverse backgrounds made the collaboration both rewarding and a chance to learn from each other’s strengths,” he said.

Daniel, who works as a strategy consultant, said they were proud just to make the finals let alone win the top prize.

“There were a lot of late nights and countless meetings approaching the case competition with the mindset of a consulting project or even a job interview,” he said.

“When they called us out there were plenty of high-fives! We were also pleased another group from our MBA cohort came second, so we were very proud.”

Second Prize - Terminal 4

Second Prize was won by a team of fellow first time Part-Time MBA students from the same cohort, Ali Alhamdani, Aby Korah, Hardik Trivedi and Joel Georg.

Terminal 4 got the crowd on their side with their custom “the Launnie Way” t-shirts and an energetic role-play to demonstrate their strategy of bringing a community flavour to the airport and partnering with local businesses such as Josef Chromy Wines.

Ali said it was the hardest challenge they had faced in the MBA so far but having their families there to watch the presentation and enjoy the celebrations made it incredibly special.

“What I’ll treasure most is how close we got together as a team. With everything that we learned about consulting, pitching and tackling a real challenge, what we gained the most is the camaraderie between us,” Ali said.

“We had so much fun throughout the whole process and laughed so much.”

Ilya said Terminal 4 stood out for their creativity and innovation, both of which were important to be successful in business.

“This group identified the pragmatics and process and even developed a framework that could actually be utilised at Launceston Airport,” Ilya said.

Third Prize - JRJT Consulting

Third Prize went to JRJT Consulting a group of Senior Executive MBA students made up of Tracey Wong, Joe Ferm and Josh Elliott.

The team took a unique and creative approach to answering the challenge by putting the airlines as the airport’s primary customer.

They included a strategy that would even be “pandemic-proof” with plans for a freight logistics revenue stream powered by solar.

“Because of the different approach choosing airlines first as the customer, the group really understood that where their airline’s bread is buttered,” Ilya said.

Ilya congratulated all the five finalists on making it to the final of this year’s case challenge and beating out tough competition.

“I think mostly it sounds like a lot of people had a lot of fun with this, which is really important and that can sometimes be lost in business,” he said.

“Please maintain that throughout your careers as you lead people in the future, please make sure you have fun with those people that you lead.”

After weeks of late nights, countless team meetings and getting outside of their comfort zones to tackle a real business problem in the aviation industry, the teams produced valuable frameworks and ideas that the judges said were immediately actionable for Launceston Airport.

Congratulations to this year’s Launceston Airport Case Challenge finalists.