Microsoft, Information Technology Authority (ITA) and OmanTel announced Team Thrizers as Oman’s National Champion of “Imagine Cup 2013”, Team Imagine Zone and Team ARMZ came in second and third place respectively. Team Thrizers received their boarding pass to the “Imagine Cup 2013” Worldwide Finals taking place in St. Petersburg, Russia between 8 and 13 July 2013.
During the final competition, the shortlisted teams presented their projects in front of a live audience and a judging panel consisting of an array of industry experts representing the Imagine Cup’s local and regional sponsors, as well as a representative of Microsoft Oman; it included Sheikh Saif Hilal Al Hosni, Business Development Manager for Microsoft Oman, Khalid Hamed Al Kharusi, Director General of the Information and Awareness Division of ITA, Khalid Al Nabhani Senior Manager, Business Systems at Omantel and Tariq Al-Barwani, Chief Executive Officer of Knowledge Oman. The judges’ diversified areas of expertise were well matched to the enthusiasm of the competitors.
Team Thrizers from the Higher College of Technology competes with Project “ReadX”. One of the greatest global challenges is perhaps Dyslexia; the idea of developing an application that is going to help Dyslexic people and will help in tackling the issue without stress. On the first use of the application, the user is going to be asked whether he/she is the Dyslexic child or the parent, because each will be using the application differently and will be given dissimilar tasks to complete.
“We are thrilled to have won the Local Finals of “Imagine Cup 2013” and motivated to represent Oman in the Imagine Cup World Finals,” Team Thrizers, said.
“We thank Microsoft and their local partners, ITA and Omantel, for their support and guidance throughout this competition, we shall do our best to make our country proud,” they added.
“We had received a good number of great projects, and we were happy to have 4 teams competing in the local finals and showcased Oman’s students’ great potential. Team Thrizers will be representing Oman in the Imagine Cup 2013 World Finals in July; our team will be coaching them over the coming few months to help them finalize their project and get ready to compete globally and hopefully win in the World Finals,” Tareq Hijazi, Regional Country Manager for Microsoft Oman and Bahrain, said.
“As the Authority responsible for implementing the Digital Oman Society and eGovernment strategy, the ITA is always keen to sponsor youth innovations and projects in the ICT field, with the aim of further developing student’s talents. Thanks to Allah, our young minds have proven that they are able to compete and to win at the international level. We thank Microsoft for organizing this event and hope that this competition will encourage companies and other institutions to organize similar competitions in support of Omani youth projects. We also congratulate the winners in advance and wish them the best in the Imagine Cup 2013 World Finals in July in Moscow, Russia,” Omar Al Shanfari, Deputy CEO for Infrastructure and eServices at ITA, said.
“We are proud at Omantel to renew our partnership with Microsoft and ITA and taking it to new heights. Omantel has a great focus on nurturing and building the capacities of young Omanis as part of our CSR strategy. Imagine Cup 2013 contributes to identifying and promoting Omani talents and helping them to carry out their dream projects not also on the regional level but also on the international level at Imagine Cup 2013,” Mohamed Yahya Al Salmi Senior Manager Corporate Communications at Omantel, said.
“The success made in the previous versions by Omani teams reaching advanced stage is a source of pride for every one of us. Omantel is very keen on providing the team members with every possible support to reach the top positions and raise the Sultanate’s name in all regional and international contests,” he added.
Al Salmi wished all the best of luck to Thrizers, the team that represents the Sultanate hoping that the team would come back with Imagine Cup 2013.
“We are committed at Omantel to support initiatives and programs that nurture Omani young talents like Imagine Cup 2013,” Al Salmi said.
Microsoft’s Imagine Cup is the world’s most prestigious student technology competition, bringing together student innovators from all over the world. This year, Microsoft has redesigned Imagine Cup around three new core competitions built on the core elements that have been most popular with students in the past 10 years — social impact and gaming — while expanding the competition’s focus on innovation and entrepreneurship.
Team Imagine Xone from Sultan Qaboos University (SQU) competes with Project “Pregnanion” which is the ultimate pregnancy companion; it is a multi-language application that all pregnant women in the world can use and benefit from in a fun and interactive way to improve their health and their baby’s health during the pregnancy and after the delivery.
Team ARMZ, a joint effort between Sultan Qaboos University and the Colleges of Applied Sciences-Nizwa, presents Project “VolunteerBook”, a social app in Windows Phone that allows users to interact freely with each other under a voluntary work umbrella. Each user can specify what domains he/she is interested in e.g. health, education, environment… Each user can act as an organizer of certain voluntary work and broadcast a message asking for support from volunteers who have already shown an interest in that type of voluntary work.