OSU business analytics team places third to win $10K at Humana-Mays competition

Monday, November 18, 2024

Media Contact:
Terry Tush | Director, Marketing and Communications | 405-744-2703 | terry.tush@okstate.edu

The Spears School of Business is building a reputation of sustained success in the
prestigious Humana-Mays Healthcare Analytics Case Competition.

A team of four students in Oklahoma State University’s business analytics and data
science master’s program (MS BAnDS) placed third in the eighth annual competition.
Debanik Chakraborty, Kusuma Lanka, Moumita Sen and Sunanda Sen won $10,000 in the
Nov. 14 finals. 

“My team dedicated countless hours and sacrificed many weekends preparing for this
competition,” Sunanda Sen said. “Placing third made all our hard work worthwhile and
was incredibly rewarding knowing we contributed meaningful insights to real-world
health care challenges.”

Reaching the top 3 in back-to-back years, OSU has sent at least one team into the
top-5 finals every year since 2021. This year’s competition featured 284 teams from
74 universities.

“Participating in the Humana-Mays competition taught me the importance of staying
focused on impactful analysis while effectively balancing teamwork and strategic thinking,”
Lanka said. “Working on a real-world health care problem reinforced the need to maintain
a clear focus on solutions that drive meaningful business outcomes amid the vast dimensions
of data.”

Texas A&M University’s Mays Business School partners with health insurance company
Humana to host the virtual competition. Beginning in September, master’s students
from across the United States tackled real-world business dilemmas requiring analytical
proficiency and strong communication. OSU advanced to the finals of the rigorous three-round
competition alongside teams from Boston University, Georgia Institute of Technology,
the University of Houston and the University of Louisville.

Dr. Goutam Chakraborty, SAS Professor of Marketing Analytics and MS BAnDS program
director, acted as OSU’s faculty co-advisor with adjunct lecturer Dr. Venu Lolla.

“Our roles were limited to cheerleading the teams,” Chakraborty said. “So, all the
credit goes to the team, their hard work and the world-class faculty who taught them
all the classes in the program, which prepared them well for this competition. We
are delighted with such consistent and excellent performances by our student teams.”

Lolla said the school is proud the team secured a spot in the top 3.

“The team approached various rounds of the competition with creativity, diligence
and tenacity,” Lolla said.

For more information about OSU’s nationally ranked MS BAnDS program, visit the Spears
School of Business website.