Finalists picked for Microsoft Imagine Cup

By agencies   |   Friday, 11 August 2006, 19:30 IST   |    1 Comments
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AGRA: The finalists have been picked for the Imagine Cup, a Microsoft tech contest, for this year. Among thousands of entries from over the world, advanced mobile technology for monitoring medical patients emerged as the crowning idea as the six finalists were named at Agra. Making their mark among 68,000 entries worldwide this year, teams from Brazil, China, Denmark, Italy, Japan and Norway were named as the finalists for the annual student contest organized by Microsoft. Giving the students a platform to develop their ideas, the event last year had the team from Greece eventually raise nearly 500,000 euros ($640,000) for technology that translates sign language into speech. Pursuing the theme change lives by improving health, many experts claimed that several designs in the competition had amazing potential to prove their worth in the long run. "This is not science fiction. I think most of these projects will become real in near future," said Mehmet Nuri Cankaya, a contest judge and managing director of Turkey's Natron Institute of Technology. Ranging from sonar for the blind to remote sensing equipment to monitor patients, the students portrayed their capabilities to the optimum with nothing but their best. Citing the death of at least 44,000 Americans each year from medical errors as one of the reasons for their innovation, the Japanese team entered their Head Mount Display, a contraption worn by doctors to access information about patients using enhanced mobile technology while the Norwegian team created a device installed in a mobile phone that monitors glucose levels and blood pressure and alerts doctors and relatives of potentially dangerous changes. "The contest stretches the imagination of the students and lets them come up with solutions to help people by making use of existing technology," said Anil K. Tripathi, Professor, Benaras Hindu University and one of the judges. Awarded a cash prize of $125,000, the winners, divided across six categories, with software design the flagship contest will be announced in New Delhi on Friday.