This is my first internship in a corporate setting, so it is much more structured in the way that the company thinks about my professional development. Every placement and project is thorougly thought through to ensure interns get the most out of it.

This is not my first internship, and one way it's different from previous internships is the scale of Cathay's business. This adds interesting complexity- you need to consider how any initiative affects different departments, who have slightly different goals. Compared to previous internships, through speaking with different departments I've been able to expand the scope of my work and take on more varied projects. The benefit I've found of being placed in a large, complex operation is that I have gained a well rounded perspective on the business, and been able to develop unique skills (like negotiating between different departments).

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For me, the most important thing is building long-lasting connections with people throughout the Swire Group and learning as much as possible about all of the different operating companies. I really feel like the SMP programme considers itself a family, so people - no matter the OpCo - are always willing to have a chat about what a career here looks like.

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I came in wanting to see how commercial decisions are actually made with data behind them — not theory, but the messy reality. And yes, it's happening. I've gone from being handed raw sales data to building something that could genuinely shape how routes are planned. What I didn't expect was learning to trust my own judgment: when the data said one thing and the field said another, I had to reason through which to believe. That's been the most valuable part.

HK is one of the most dynamic cities in the world, with a bustling and vibrant culture no other city can really replicate. It is also very well positioned geographically, with China Mainland and Southeast Asia within reach. As someone considering a long-term career in Asia, having this access is very important to me.

I initially moved to HK to work, after completing my undergraduate studies- I stayed for my Masters because I loved the pace and the people. I love how dynamic HK is and I've experienced so much: the natural features of the city, the busy areas where it feels like a real metropolis, and the chance to try different internships and work environments. I would love to introduce the other interns to the variety of experiences which can be had in HK, and show them that although it may be a new place it's welcoming and easy to explore/ even settle down here.

I would definitely like to introduce them to the food. There's no other place that does Dim Sum like home, whilst having access to such a variety of international cuisine.

Similarly, showing the breadth that HK encompasses, from skyscrapers to a beach just 20 minutes away.

Very simple, there are very few comparable companies that could give me the same breadth across industries and roles. Their approach to talent cultivation is unmatched - investing a great deal in training young people. This internship is a perfect example of that - the fact that they sponsor interns to travel halfway (or more) across the world to come here.

The approach Swire takes to managing operating companies, talent and even individual projects is what attracted me. The focus on longevity alongside innovation seems to be the perfect way to respect the strong history of the company, which continuing to drive onwards.

The individual strengths of each operating company are emphasised, but they all share a common goal to continue to serve communities in the long term.

For talent, the development opportunities offered by Swire are unparalleled and you will be working alongside passionate, driven colleagues.

Even individual projects tie into longevity: Cathay is currently celebrating 80 years of history, while continuing to innovate and focus on being a modern airline.

Swire thinks in decades, not quarters — that long-term mindset appealed to me. I wanted to work somewhere that treats its people as a genuine investment rather than short-term resource. The scale and heritage matter too: getting to work on a real operational problem inside a business this established, with mentors who've built careers here, felt like a place I could actually learn, feel comfortable asking questions and growing on a professional and personal level.

As a non-HKer, my knowledge about the Swire internship programme was relatively limited and two-dimensional. Initially I thought that my scope of work and interaction with people would be entirely concentrated in Properties, however I have found it to be the opposite. We are actively encouraged to engage across OpCos. In terms of Props specifically, Swire's business model is very different to the prior Real Estate exposure I'd had - an 'owner-operator' mode as opposed to passive investment management focused solely on yields. This has meant that I've been learning much more about how portoflios are actually run on a day-to-day basis, which is important when training to become a manager.

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People were wondering why I chose to do Beverages with a clear props background, from studying Land Economy to previous internships.

Although I didn't know the particulars of Coca-Cola, I knew that I wanted to join an FMCG firm, to experience how such a well-established name, still requires such logistics, cooperation and change.

To try a different industry, one which requires working across teams and understanding the whole commercial process from planning to execution to capabilities, is refreshing and incredibly exciting.

My project is thinking about how we can improve our rewards scheme on the Taikoo Place tenant app to encourage discovery of different amenities and F&B around the portfolio through mission-based rewards. The most intellectually rewarding part was seeing the project from start to finish – interviewing various stakeholders across departments, evaluating technology solutions, and figuring out how to piece the initiative with broader company developments.

I'm working on implementing agentic AI in Cathay: external benchmarking, AI discussions across departments, conceptualising possible tools, and developing prototypes. I was able to present this external research at the team's global conference, facilitate an AI workshop alongside SMPs, develop a destination inspiration bot, and an external research agent bot.

I evaluate Coca-Cola’s redesigned sales routes using a time-motion study to ensure they drive true operational efficiency. By shadowing field reps and analyzing over 189,000 annual records, I established precise visit benchmarks. Ultimately, these insights deliver actionable improvements that sharpen execution and drive incremental revenue.

SPROPS is a big company comprised of lots of different people and teams with lots of different targets/views/KPIs. I've come to realise that getting projects through and convincing people to go forward with them is much more than just putting slides together and drawing up timelines - most of the work is in convincing other teams that this is worth their time and effort and aligns with their goals.

One mindset I was able to adopt was linking small scale insights to broader team goals/high level principles. For example, in Direct Retail the goal is to become an offer curator by better understanding customer intent to deliver targeted recommendations or offers. When presenting at the Direct Retail Conference, I linked each individual benchmarking case study to the team's broader strategic objective. By making my presentation relevant to the main goal of the team, I was able to engage the audience and have a fruitful discussion on the driving value in Cathay.

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Definitely the JSS induction day. I am an aviation fanatic so getting to see the widebody aircrafts in the HAECO hangar ticked an item off my bucket list

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On my first field day, when visiting suburban/rural areas in Fanling, it was hot & sunny. As I was timing and observing the sales rep, the elderly store owner gave me a chair to sit on and told us to pick any drink we wanted. Even though we were supposedly delivering the customer an experience, they instantly returned the hospitality. Beyond promoting our products, organising their stock and checking their inventories, we proceeded to play with their baby grandchild and have very fun conversations together. This sort of community and genuine friendship that is built between our team and customers truly exemplifies the warmth and passion that Swire Coca-Cola really embodies.

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Working with Tracey Ma (Head of Global Direct Retail) has been one of the most inspiring parts of my internship. Firstly, I was able to see how she navigates tricky discussions, where participants have opposing opinions, and brings these discussions back to high level commonalities (instead of granular differences). Hearing her speak at the Global Direct Retail conference was also incredibly engaging- she took a case study from another industry (Nike), and related it back to the key goals of the team. This case study showed what is possible in direct retail, and her engagement with the team inspired each region to feel they can make an impact.

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As my team is smaller than most, the culture is very much one of open conversation and debate. I am actively encouraged to ask questions and challenge assumptions. I would say that my style is one of a project manager, I often like to see the intricacies of the particular project I'm working on, and I will try to familiarise myself with new concepts as quickly as possible. For example, my digital project involves an understanding of software integration

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It's funny that the main goal of the Route-to-market team here is to achieve operational efficiency, and that's exactly the culture I can see them perform on the daily.

They are focused on several tasks simultaneously, where I see one member sending out the daily stats and data from our SDR orders. To seeing one member heavily coordinate across other teams in sales to support understandings and upcoming presentations. One thing for sure is that they are always finding ways to work faster and better, such as new methods of simplifying data processing through Excel.

Having done a couple of fieldwork days, I hope to provide them with insight and feedback on how their redesigned routes work in person.

I have made lifelong friends here for sure, everyone has been willing to socialise beyond the workplace and I feel like there is a real drive to build genuine connections. As we are paired with other interns from different OpCos for our group project, I have learnt a lot from the other interns about how to improve my content delivery skills. It is also useful to learn from the HK-raised interns about intercultural communication.

Something heartening from the first day (when all interns were together) was that we were slightly sad to be leaving each other and going to different work locations. Now that we've been able to meet after work, it's been great to hear stories from different interns and compare our experiences. Gwyn and Kris have spoken with a lot of eloquence and passion so I've been able to learn about different OpCos. I especially enjoyed joining other interns during the beach clean- it was quite a good way to bond, as we were all working towards a clear common goal!

Every single intern here just clicks, during the first day of induction, when we all were getting to know one another, it felt as if we've all been long time friends. From humour, to shared values, to all having that drive to do the very best we could here. There's always a conception of competition amongst interns, but everyone here is truly supportive in our respective goals.

I'm not just saying this for the camera, but these are life-long friends that I am so happy to have made!

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In my first few days, I had a slight desire to learn team dynamics before jumping in with my own ideas. However, I quickly picked up on the team culture of supporting new ideas which aren't fully formed. So I've put aside the thought that any aspect of the job might not be for an intern to weigh in on. Instead, every time I've given an opinion, shown a demo, or raised a challenge, I've been given support and encouragement. I was surprised at how much this team support has given me confidence, and the willingness to present my ideas with more self-assurance.

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See Gwyneth's response - I am in her group

Our final presentation is focused on building a staff-facing AI tool for the Upper House, which can empower UH team members to deliver more personalised experiences to guests. Using the reasoning power of AI, our platform can review insights on the customer intent of each guest, and develop suggested actions for UH team members to operationalise these insights. We are looking to build on the passion UH team members have for hospitality, by informing them of high-impact moments to engage guests. We hope to impress the audience with the level of personalisation our platform can help the UH achieve: we can build an individual portrait of each guest, and think about what a particular moment means for them.

Kris & I are actually working together on the final presentation. My group's building an AI agent for Cathay Pacific that handles flight rebooking during disruptions — like when a typhoon shuts Hong Kong airport. Right now, when thousands are stranded, the complex cases pile onto human staff who get overwhelmed. Our agent reasons through a passenger's whole itinerary and rebooks them proactively, with their confirmation. To wow the judges, we're telling it as one passenger's story rather than a tech pitch — so they feel the problem before we solve it."

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This internship has made me realise that I should be more open-minded. After speaking to SMPs who have been seconded across industries, I've realised that learning opportunities often come from places where you least expect them, and that having a 'rigid' view of my career timeline (i.e. not being open to exploring different industries) may not necessarily be the right way of approaching it. Initially, I thought my career interests would span only a few select industries such as real estate, but after meeting SMPs working in FMCG (SCC) I learned that there are lots of valuable opportunities in industries that I hadn't previously thought of working in.

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That the most valuable work sits between the data and the reality it represents — numbers give you scale, but you need to understand what's actually happening on the ground to interpret them. I've realised I want a career that keeps me close to both. I also learned I enjoy the moment where analysis becomes a decision — turning a spreadsheet into something a business can act on. That intersection of rigour and real-world impact is where I want to build.

Moreover, I simply love working with people. Having the opportunity to learn across several teams, to meeting executives from all walks of life, culture and expertise in different industries. That is something I cherish.

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1. My specific project is helping redesign the tenant rewards scheme on the Taikoo Place app. 2. I will remain in Taikoo Place but will meet with my line manager/secondary supervisor regularly, I may also attend a few stakeholder meetings. 3. There is one meeting in Taikoo Place but would need to get consent from the ~5 others attending. 4. Ivy is able to attend. My project doesn't concern her department but we could pretend that she is one of the stakeholders I'd interview

1. I think the most suitable AI project is the external research agent I'm building with a team in Sales and Distribution. This bot ingests live news articles, debates them among a team of agents and outputs analysis and hypotheses which can help the S&D team. Other projects: destination inspiration, benchmarking on agentic commerce. 2.We could recreate a brainstorming session which involved flipcharts, pinning notes to the wall, organizing ideas physically. I also have a deck for the project. We could film in the Experience Zone (which is a general innovation zone in Cathay). 3. I haven't received restrictions on areas, just a note that when filming in public spaces we shouldn't focus on the faces of people in the background. 4. Unfortunately, Ken is not available on the 14th- I can contact my line manager/other SMPs who have supported me throughout the internship. // Short Written Description: I'm working on ways agentic AI can be implemented in Cathay: from external benchmarking/outside industry trends, enabling discussions on AI between different teams, ideation on customer-facing and staff-facing tools, all the way to actually developing prototypes. I was able to conduct this external research and present at the team's global conference, facilitate an AI workshop alongside some SMPs, and work on developing two prototypes (one for a customer-facing destination inspiration bot, and the other for an external research agent bot). I have enjoyed bringing together different teams (regional/within Cathay HQ), facilitating idea sharing, navigate different perspectives and share my own viewpoint and prototypes. One other digital-related part of my project is exploring the value proposition of Cathay's mobile app: exploring ways to build trust, boost engagement, and drive mobile revenue.

1. The goal of my project is to understand how efficiently Coca-Cola's sales team services the thousands of shops they visit, and whether their newly designed routes are working as intended. I began by spending days on the ground with sales representatives, observing the reality of a working day — building relationships with shop owners, promoting our products, servicing the coolers, and the travel and admin that fills the gaps in between. I then turned to a full year's worth of digital visit data to test whether what I'd seen first-hand held true across more than 186,000 store visits, cleaning the data, justifying and removing anomalies, and creating a benchmark to show where time is well spent and where it isn't. The point of that benchmark is practical: by standardising how long each type of visit should take, the business can plan routes more effectively, free up reps' time from low-value admin so more of their day goes into selling and relationship-building, and give them the capacity to reach more outlets and uncover new ones — improvements that translate directly into stronger execution and incremental revenue. The most valuable insight came from combining the two sources: the numbers told me what was happening, but the days in the field told me why.

2. No unfortunately those agreements would take a longer time.

3. Yes, here are the suggested places: - 17/F: Life-size Wall → Rearranging drink magnets + advertisement/ promotional material on the Picture of Success Board (looks like print-out of a real shop → imitate practical field work) - 17/F: WinWIn Meeting Room (coca cola background) → intimate RTM team meeting (Team no. 1) - 17/F: By quiet zone lounge (Coca Cola neon sign) → talking with Joe - Right Outside Main Entrance (Clear Title of Swire Coca-Cola) → standing beside the large Coca-Cola and Bonaqua Trucks whilst wearing safety vest and talking to the Sales Rep holding SFA device (Team no. 3: sales rep) - Coca Cola Museum → SMP buddy Joe pointing at different artefacts sharing about the rich history of Coke - 17/F The Bistro de Red → show getting bottle + cheers using Coca Cola glass bottles with Karlo Manager

4. Yes