[Provided by Yeungnam University of Science and Technology]
[Provided by Yeungnam University of Science and Technology]

Students from Yeungnam University of Science and Technology's i-Business and Accounting department won the Korea Student Aid Foundation president's award at the 2026 Daegu Public Data and AI Startup Competition, the university announced Wednesday.

The competition was organized jointly by the Daegu city government and the Daegu Digital Innovation Promotion Institute (DIP) to encourage data-driven entrepreneurship by identifying creative ideas and innovative services using public data and AI.

The award ceremony was held at DIP on Tuesday. A team comprising second-year student Cha Mi-hyeon and first-year student Baek In-seong, both from the i-Business and Accounting department, took the prize in the idea planning category for their entry "Welfare Secretary — Ttoktto."

The winning entry is an AI co-pilot platform that combines public data and AI to connect social workers with digitally underserved populations.

The service was designed to support the entire welfare administration process — from identifying eligible recipients and conducting home consultations to recommending welfare services and drafting application forms. It draws on public data to deliver tailored welfare information and improve administrative efficiency.

"Applying the startup processes and AI data methods I learned in class to an actual competition helped me develop the idea into something concrete," said Cha, one of the award recipients. "The process of thinking through how to address a social problem was itself a great learning experience, and I'm deeply grateful to have achieved such a good result."

Yeungnam University of Science and Technology President Lee Jae-yong said the award reflected students' efforts to creatively tackle social problems using public data and AI. "We will continue to strengthen entrepreneurship education and practice-oriented AI education to nurture convergence talent that contributes to the development of our local community and industry," he said.


kbj7653@heraldcorp.com