L'Oréal Malaysia Brandstorm 2021- Play, Experiment, Innovate.

Kuala Lumpur, 19 January 2021 – L'Oréal Malaysia today hosted the the 29th edition of National Brandstorm Finals. This year’s challenge is to Invent the Beauty Shopping Experience through Entertainment, exploring the booming fields of retail and e-commerce. The business case to be solved differs each year and participants are mentored by L'Oréal’s digital experts throughout the competition.

In a post-Covid-19 pandemic era, online retail and e-commerce in the global market is more significant than ever. Despite the pandemic shifting the competition on to a virtual platform, Brandstorm this year had a total of 61,347 registration, 38,978 participants globally.

 On a national scale, Brandstorm 2021 had over 600 entries across 52 different universities from all over the country. The competition provides students a platform to enhance their entrepreneurial and creativity skills, in addition to offering participants the unique opportunity to come up with innovations for the beauty industry.

 “Online & Offline experiences fueled by data are completely transforming the way we engage with our consumers. Entertainment and gaming are key to making these experiences memorable and the L'Oréal Brandstorm is one of the ways that we look to nurture young talents to think outside the box. L’Oréal’s passion for education and L’Oréal Brandstorm is a demonstration of this commitment we have towards enriching and inspiring young talents,” said L'Oréal Malaysia’s Country Managing Director, Malek Bekdache.

The finalists were assessed on four criterias – Innovations (30%), Usefulness (30%), Feasibility (20%), Scalability (20%). Each team were also mentored by L’Oréal’s marketing and e-commerce experts in preparing for their finals.

In a virtual event held on Monday, 19th April 2021, the three teams presented their innovation and here are the sypnosis of their pitch : -

 Team GAMINE

Team Gamine proposes to use LOLA to personalise skincare experience to every user. LOLA is a subscription-based AI skin analytic mobile application which aims to provide affordable, accessible and professional skincare experience. The two subscription packages offered are Standard Package and Virtual Dermatologist Package. The standard package is for users who looks for skincare products recommendation while the virtual dermatologist package is for those who looks for professional dermatologist advice. Gamine aims to reinvent customer skincare shopping experience in the LOLA Community, which is a skincare social media, where users are free to share and post information. LOLA community is the place for users to form bond and learn about skincare knowledge.

Team S.E.E

Developing a hyper-personalised skincare solution called MyKiehls, revolutionised by AI with features such as Face Recognition, Voice Assistance, and Education, fully integrated into the Blockchain network.

MyKiehl’s expansion strategy comprises expanding MyKiehls across the US. After establishing MyKiehls, they aim to be the market leader in AI skincare solutions in the US. By 2024, the aim is to expand across the North America region. By 2025, they aim to pioneer new data analysis methods that ultimately drive us closer to developing the Asia Pacific region.  

Team SHIELD & REGENERATION

The core of their idea is to normalize skincare amongst men through gaming. Introducing a set of products called Shield and Regeneration through a new division within Garnier that they call Garnier Gaming. These products will be designed as replicas of in-game health items and serve to protect gamers from blue light and just, natural oily skin. They believe these strategies have the ability to penetrate this untapped market. With this, they anticipate that these products will soon be the essential gears for gamers and men everywhere.

Team SHIELD & REGENERATION bagged the champion title and have won a ticket to represent the country in the International leg to compete Internationally against teams from all around the globe organised by L'Oréal. The team from University of Nottingham Malaysia- Ler Jie Sze (Finance, Accounting and Management), Christopher Khoo (Mechanical Engineering) and Daniel Cheong (Mechanical Engineering) said ‘The entire journey has been very rewarding, and it has also really helped open our eyes in the world of beauty and how we can revolutionize the industry with gaming. We appreciate the various skills we have picked up along the way ranging from slide design to pitching, and we can safely say that we have come out of this competition more skillful than when we entered. We are looking forward to the new challenges that we may face in terms of the validity and strength of our idea, the opportunity to be inspired by more guidance from L'Oréal and meet fellow Brandstormers from around the globe. We feel proud to be representing Malaysia and will take advantage of the opportunity to bring our idea to the main stage. We know it’ll be challenging ahead, but we welcome them with open arms, and will tackle them head on!”

National grand prize winners are awarded a three-month internship with L'Oréal providing invaluable experience in Malaysia’s leading beauty fast-moving consumer goods company. They are also given the opportunity to be upskilled in Digital Analytics by the Chief Digital Officer and a Coursera Learning certificates worth up to RM5000.

A team also from University of Nottingham Malaysia, comprising of Finance & Economics students– Poa Yee Shuang (Finance, Accounting and Management), Lua Yun Xin (Economics) and Jaclyn Hu Xin Yiu (Economics) collectively known as Team GAMINE, emerged as the First Runners-Up.

Malaysia had once won the champion award in 2015 at the International level and we hope that our National Champion will make the nation proud once again.

About Brandstorm

L'Oréal’s Brandstorm, an exciting international competition, offers the brightest young minds from Malaysia and around the world the opportunity to exhibit their potential in a multi-discipline and multi-national initiative with world-class experience, specially designed and organized by L'Oréal. Brandstorm was created 29 years ago and has grown to become the world’s biggest innovation competition for students. The students have a few months to create a concept and work on its feasibility while receiving mentorship from L'Oréal’s top digital experts. Registrations close on the 8th of March 2021.