Two Singaporean NTU students win internship at Red Bull’s Formula One HQ
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Charis Chua (left) and Heng Yi-Hsin will head to Red Bull Racing's headquarters in Milton Keynes for a two-month stint.
PHOTO: RED BULL
SINGAPORE – Two students have earned the “opportunity of a lifetime” to work as interns at Red Bull Racing’s headquarters in Milton Keynes, England, after beating thousands of applicants here in a competition for the two-month stint.
Charis Chua, 22, and Heng Yi-Hsin, 21, undergraduates at the Nanyang Technological University’s (NTU) Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information (WKWSCI), were picked after a multi-stage process that included a personality evaluation, video submission, virtual interview and case-study challenge.
They were notified via a special message by three-time Formula One world champion Max Verstappen.
Pokka, the official distributor of Red Bull in Singapore, on March 21 launched the Red Bull Intern Championship to offer two individuals a once-in-a-lifetime chance to work with the world championship team.
Thousands of applicants responded to what was touted as the “world’s fastest job ad”, said the team in a statement.
Heng, who is currently an intern photojournalist at The Straits Times, said: “I stumbled upon F1 a few years ago and was immediately hooked. Back then, working in F1 felt like a pipe dream.
“So when the Red Bull Intern Championship was announced, I pulled out all the stops because I knew the competition would be tough.”
Chua, who will be embarking on a hospitality and events internship with Red Bull, has dreamt of working in F1 since she was 15 years old.
She said: “The passion of everyone involved in the sport really drew me in and I made a promise to myself that I would put in the work to be part of it one day.
“When this competition was announced, I knew this was the opportunity of a lifetime I had been waiting for, but winning it wouldn’t be easy.”
As part of the Red Bull Intern Championship, a unique outreach event was held at NTU in March, when a miniature remote-controlled car zipped through the campus to encourage students to participate in the competition.
Professor Sharon Ng, deputy dean at NTU’s Nanyang Business School, which partnered the team on the activation event, said: “We are proud that two NTU students were selected for the internships in the UK amid the stiff competition. At NTU, we highly value experiential learning, and internships are a key part of that.”
WKWSCI chair, Professor May Lwin, said: “To have both winners, selected from thousands of applicants, from the Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information is wonderful.
“The two students have applied their strong grounding in communication studies and our global market approach to impress the judges.”
At Milton Keynes, Chua and Heng will gain hands-on experience and work closely with experienced members of the Red Bull Racing team. They will learn about the team’s operations and other areas such as engineering and logistics.
After their overseas stint, the duo will return to the Republic to work with the team at the Sept 20-22 Singapore Grand Prix.
Follow the Singaporean duo’s adventures on Red Bull’s TikTok Instagram website TikTok Instagram
