Imagining the future
Some of the finest university minds step from the Microsoft Imagine Cup stage to a global journey of technology innovation.
Thursday, November 24 2011 || Features || BY Mark Revington
Wow, is that New York mayor Michael Bloomberg on stage? And later, yes, it’s Desperate Housewives star Eva Longoria. Did I mention the stage they tread is in New York’s famous Koch Theatre at the Lincoln Centre for the Performing Arts, home to the city’s ballet and opera companies for more than 40 years? It’s the same stage now illuminated by a dazzling light show and flanked by a sound system pumping out loud pop.
“Rudolph Nereyev danced on that stage,” whispers my neighbour.
Downstairs the student audience is in full swing, laughing, cat calling, cheering and flag waving.
It’s the last prizegiving at the global final of the 2011 Microsoft Imagine Cup and the students are here to party and support their national teams. Some of these kids have never been out of their own country before, let alone spent a week in New York.
The idea of the Imagine Cup is to challenge the finest minds from universities across the world to solve the planet’s biggest problems through technology.
The competition started in 2003, attracting around 1000 entries. This year more than 350,000 students from over 70 countries entered, across nine categories. Country winners and their entourages, along with the whole Imagine Cup circus, took over the Marriott Hotel that borders Times Square. I was there as a judge in the software development category with about 40 others from different parts of the globe — a mix of university professors and entrepreneurs.
Software development is the glamour category of the Imagine Cup and a team from the University of Auckland made the final six for the second year running.
Last year it was Team One Beep, which placed third in the software challenge with an innovative solution to deliver data to children in developing countries based on the One Laptop per Child program.
This year it was Team One Buzz — Vinny Lohan, Kayo Lakardia, Steven Kang and Edward Peek — with a software package to combat the spread of malaria, an ambitious project combining supply chain management with data collection and predictive analysis. Lohan and Lakadia are the common thread between One Beep and One Buzz.
