A serious stage
for young thinkers.
The Global Quest Competition (GQC) is an international student innovation award programme. We run a single, year-long cycle across three cities — Hong Kong, London and New York — and we judge work to the same standard a university research panel or an early-stage investor would apply.
To give students the experience of doing original work in public — under honest scrutiny, with mentors who treat them as colleagues, and on the same kind of stage their work could one day reach.
The GQC brief.
Each cycle, we publish a single open-ended brief — a problem area, not a question with a known answer. Recent briefs have included “How might a young person change how their school spends money?”, “Make care work less invisible”, and “Re-think the local high street”. Teams are free to interpret the brief through any of the four award tracks.
What we do not ask for is a polished startup pitch. The deliverables are designed to mirror real research and real product practice: a problem statement, an evidence pack, a working prototype or campaign artefact, and a six-minute defence in front of a jury. The path from idea to defence is mentored, structured and written down — so that the experience travels with the student long after the prize ceremony.
From one school to three cities.
GQC began in 2019 as an after-school clinic for fifty Hong Kong sixth-formers who wanted feedback on independent research projects that didn’t fit existing science fairs. Within two cohorts the clinic outgrew its school and reconstituted as an open competition with mentors drawn from HKUST, the British Council and a handful of working analysts and founders.
In 2023 we added a London edition with Imperial College’s Enterprise Lab; in 2025 a New York edition hosted at NYU Stern’s Berkley Center. The three editions now form a single cycle: teams apply to the edition closest to them, the strongest of each move on to the Global Final, and a small Invitational Track brings returning finalists and partner-school nominees into the senior round.
GQC is structurally similar to programmes such as the James Dyson Award, the Lemelson-MIT Student Prize, the Conrad Challenge and Hult’s OnCampus rounds — but with two differences we hold to: every team receives a written critique, and entries are judged on research craft, not just commercial promise.
Three things we do
differently.
Every entry — winners, finalists, and teams who don’t advance — receives a structured written critique signed by two reviewers. We think that’s the part of a competition that actually compounds.
Our rubric weighs evidence, honesty about limitations, and ethics alongside originality. A team that admits what it doesn’t know often scores higher than one that sells a polished story.
Most student competitions are national. GQC is deliberately three editions in three regions, with one set of standards, one jury pool and one final. The cohort effect matters as much as the prize.
Who runs the programme.
GQC is operated by the Global Quest Competition Foundation, a non-profit constituted in Hong Kong with regional chapters in the United Kingdom and the United States. The Foundation answers to an academic council that sets the brief and the rubric, and an industry council that funds the prize pool and the regional finals. Day-to-day delivery is run by a small permanent team out of the three host cities.
Read more on the Committees & Jury page, or skim our Partners for the universities, agencies and venture firms that make each edition possible.
A problem area, not a prompt with a hidden answer.
Each cycle the academic council publishes one open-ended brief — a territory, not a quiz. Teams may interpret it through Digital & AI or Brand & Communication. The 2026 brief will be posted on this site when applications open on 2 March; until then, treat previous briefs as a guide to tone: “How might a young person change how their school spends money?”, “Make care work less invisible”, “Re-think the local high street.” None of those had a correct product. All of them rewarded teams who went and spoke to someone.
Governance is deliberately unglamorous. The academic council sets the brief and the rubric and can send an entry to ethics review. The industry council funds prizes and supplies most jurors; it does not rewrite scores. City hosts provide rooms, clinics and public exhibit space. The permanent team — a small group in the three cities — runs logistics, bursaries and the certificate system. Membership of the councils is listed on Committees & Jury. We do not announce celebrity judges, and we do not sell the jury list as a marketing asset.
People ask whether GQC is “like ISEF” or “like a startup weekend.” It is like neither. ISEF is a research-fair pathway through affiliate fairs to Phoenix; we are not on that pathway. A weekend sprint is too short for the evidence pack we require. The honest comparison is a selective extra-curricular research-and-venture studio with three live chapters. Read The Field before you spend a year collecting logos.
If you are a school considering a partnership, the useful question is not “will this help university applications?” (sometimes) but “will our students get written critique they can reuse?” That is the part of GQC that compounds. Contact the partner desk via Become a Partner.