Hult Prize is often referred as Nobel Prize for students.

Li spent two years to form his team, research and participate in the challenge under the University College London team.

Li’s mother Wen Ling Mei , in an interview with Sin Chew Daily, said when she saw former US president Bill Clinton announced her son’s team as winner, she was overjoyed and in tears. 

“My son was excited and sent me the good news. I could not believe when I was Clinton handed the award to him,’’ she said. 

Li is also a grandson of former MCA deputy president Lee Kim Sai. Lee and his wife are proud of the grandson.

Hult Prize challenge started in 2009 under Clinton Global Initiative aimed at leveraging on young people’s idea to generate start-up and solve the world’s most critical social challenges in a sustainable manner. 

The theme for 2018 Transform –Harnessing the Power of Energy sees six student teams enter the finals. They are: Noor Medical from Albert-Ludwig University Freiburg, SunRice from University College London, Phyta from University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Impact Rays from International Islamic University of Malaysia, U-light from American University of Sharjah and Empower Energy from University of Oxford. 

Wen said this is her son’s first time taking part in a major international competition and she did not have a lot of expectations from the beginning. 

Since young she took her son to attend public speaking and leadership courses. He participated in many competitions too.

Li left for England to study biomedicine in 2016. Utilising his leadership skill, he formed a team comprising of students from Hong Kong, England and Singapore where he decided to submit the research project for competition. 

The Singapore classmate withdrew halfway and Li found a Malaysian classmate as replacement. 

SunRice won the competition in England and later joined Hult Prize challenge to compete with 100,000 teams throughout the world. 

SunRise and 39 other teams later were short listed in semi-finals and then one of the six finalists. 

Wen said her son would be using the cash award to form a company.

SunRice is a rice drying service that aims to reduce rice wastage and empower rice farmers in South East Asia. They bridge the gap between off-the-shelf rice drying technology and rice farmers that could not afford it thus making the drying technology more accessible for poor farmers. 

According to the Hult Prize website, rice farmers are currently stuck in a poverty cycle, they cannot afford modern drying technologies, they lose rice due to traditional drying practices and this leads to food insecurity. 

They are currently piloting in Letpadan in Myanmar and in the process of setting up first dryer for the upcoming harvest season.