HIGHER EDUCATION COMMISSION AND MICROSOFT PAKISTAN ANNOUNCE THE ‘IMAGINE CUP’ WINNERS FROM PAKISTAN TO COMPETE IN GLOBAL COMPETITION 2018 IN SEATTLE
Karachi: Microsoft Pakistan today proudly announced the Pakistan winners of Imagine Cup 2018 at a grand Event hosted at Higher Education Commission Pakistan in Sector H9. Imagine Cup continues to foster innovation among students and enables them to transform their ambitions into reality.
With a clear vision the winning team from NUST – Team Fe Amaan, their idea to monitor fetal health with a cheap wearable device, in a bid to reduce the birth causality rate in Pakistan & globally was the winner among 28 finalist teams from across the country. Congratulating the winners of this year’s national finals Dr Arshad Ali; Executive Director HEC said “Imagine Cup is all about innovation, transformation and what comes next. Imagine cup continues to cultivate a spirit of social and technological entrepreneurship, empowering students to use their creativity to address real societal problems through technology. We have seen extremely innovative ideas coming in and the students who have been participating especially in the imagine cup and so many of them have gone on to establish their own startups that are now becoming multimillion dollar companies. I am proud of our students for participating in this Global event and I am sure they will bring laurels for Pakistan”. The team will now represent Pakistan at the upcoming worldwide finals in Seattle, USA, to compete among global teams for a USD $100,000 prize.
Microsoft Pakistan: An outstanding participation across the region
Microsoft Imagine Cup continues to witness strong participation from Pakistan, as well as world over. This year, as an initiative of the Strategic Partnership with HEC; Microsoft Pakistan reached out to more than 56 campuses this year through onsite sessions in a bid to create awareness around the competition and effectively market it to the audience, which resulted in record breaking project entries (102+) in this competition, 40% & 60% above from 2017 & 2016 respectively. HEC’s commitment to the academia and students is reflected as Microsoft drives the Imagine Cup to highlight Pakistan’s position on the leader boards – Thus, Pakistan ranks as the TOP country in the Middle East and Africa cluster, with the highest number of project submissions and competitors in Imagine Cup. Pakistan also ranks 3rd worldwide, in the same category students from various universities participated enthusiastically, as the competition received an overwhelming response. A lot of remote and underprivileged areas were targeted specifically in the drive for Imagine Cup, particularly Hyderabad, Jamshoro, Sukkur and Quetta. Students were initially evaluated in Regional finals, held in different cities and the best teams competed to win the National Finals. The winning teams showcased their innovative thinking, technical skills and ground-breaking solutions to address everyday challenges.
Country General Manager Microsoft Pakistan Mr. Abid Zaidi said “As Microsoft we strive to bring the right set of tools and technology towards the students so that they can change the work for the better. The way we look at our students, we feel that they are the agents of change and they just need the right set of tools to succeed. The energy these students are bringing to Imagine cup is phenomenal. As a technology company we want to empower our students and enable them to shape our future “
Imagine Cup is one of Microsoft’s many efforts to transform skill development, nurture budding technologists and foster collaborative and innovative spirit. This global technology competition boasts of several success stories emerging from the competition. It’s a great platform to innovate, get recognized and eventually get enabled to bring about a positive change. Historically, Pakistan has always ranked high in the Middle East region, with the highest number of project submissions and competitors in the Imagine Cup. Pakistan will continue to feature prominently in future competitions.
