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Microsoft Announces The Finalists Of The Imagine Cup Jordan 2010
Published May 20, 2010
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As part of its commitment to promoting innovation and enhancing IT education in Jordan, Microsoft announced the five finalists of the Imagine Cup Jordan 2010, which was held at the Royal Scientific Society on May 12th. The winning team will represent the Kingdom at the Imagine Cup 2010 worldwide finals in Poland in July.
Muhammad Arrabi, Developer and Platform Evangelism Lead, Microsoft Jordan, stated, “Our ultimate goal is for the Jordanian IT sector to compete globally. This is why international student competitions are very important to enhancing education in Jordan. They raise the bar for our students to compete with the best of the best, and they provide them with global exposure and connections.”
He added, “Imagine Cup is the mother of collegiate IT competitions because it does not focus on a specific skill like programming, but rather it challenges the students to build full systems and solve real problems. Imagine Cup challenges the students to dream big, think practical, and build feasible systems.”
The winning team known as OaSys Soft team, which is made up of students from both the German Jordanian University (GJU) and Princess Sumaya University for Technology (PSUT), created a wireless network system that monitors the expansion of the desert and maps the results using Silverlight on Bing Maps. The project was designed by Hani Abu Huwaij, Yousef Wadi and Alexander Viktorov from GJU, Monir Abu Hilal from PSUT, and supervised by Mohammad Saleh.
The second place winner, better known as the Part II team, created a child care system that monitors infants by sending alerts to the mother or doctor on their mobiles if something goes wrong such as a child getting sick or hurt. The team is made up of students from Petra University that includes Yaser Saleh, Rashid Shobaki, Mohamed Azam and Ahmed Barqawi, and supervised by Dr. Abdel Kareem Al-Banna.
The third place winner, the MicroStar team, created a paperless receipt system known as Bill-Air, where a supermarket sends receipts to a phone instead of printing it out on paper. The project was designed by Faris Khasawneh and Khaldoun Darabseh from the Jordan University for Science and Technology (JUST), and supervised by Dr. Raed Shatnawi.
The fourth place winner, known as the GetFit team, created a social network that tracks physical activity between people and creates competitions to get fit. The project was designed by Sameer Sartawi, Muhannad Nasser and Sohaib Bayaineh from JUST, and supervised by Dr. Natheer Khasawneh.
The fifth place winner, the Future Plan team, created a social media program to simplify and facilitate requests for volunteer work. The project was designed by Wassim Shehadeh, Laith Dhawahir and Mohammed Khamash from PSUT, and supervised by Mohmmed Saleh.
Honorary mention goes to the A2N team from Applied Science University and the J-Force team from JUST.
The jury consisted of six experts in the fields of technology, academia and business that included Dr. Dirar Abu Saymeh, Adey Salamin, Jihad Rabi, Dr. Omar Al-Jarrah, Laith Zreikat, and Muhanad Omar.
Now in its 9th year, the Imagine Cup is the world’s premier student technology competition hosted by Microsoft. Open to all students around the globe, the Imagine Cup is a serious challenge that draws incredible talent. The competition spans one year, beginning with local, regional, and online contests and ending with the finalists attending the Worldwide Finals. For 2010, the Worldwide Finals will be in Warsaw, Poland, from July 3-8, 2010.
The United Nations has identified some of the hardest challenges in the world today in its Millennium Development Goals — ranging from reducing poverty and halting the spread of HIV/AIDS to providing universal primary education. The Imagine Cup calls on programmers, designers, and technologists to rise to these challenges and use the Development Goals as their inspiration.
The competition has 5 tracks that include Software, Embedded, Game design, Media, and IT. There are multiple rounds before getting to the finals and each country holds a competition round for the software track. In Jordan, approximately 62 teams registered for the Imagine Cup with 32 of them for the software track.
All Imagine Cup competitors received access to free software programs from an extended list of 83 Microsoft software titles, software design technologies that they used while creating their projects, and exclusive learning resources through the Microsoft IT Academy Program. The competitors will enroll in Microsoft's business skill training courses, which are available at the Microsoft Innovation Center (MIC).
Jordanian students have participated in the Imagine Cup since 2005. In 2009, Jordan had around 30 teams participate, each made up of around 3 students. In Cairo 2009, Jordanian students received the Bronze award, where a team of students from PSUT won the Third Place in the Interoperability Track. Their project was a mobile-phone application to locate missing children – in addition to other capabilities.
For more iformation:
Karim Mardam-Bey
Account Director
iRelations
T: +9626 461 1014
F: +9626 461 1018
Posted by
VMD - [Virtual Marketing Department]
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