Moratuwa University Team Wins the Imagine Cup Sri Lanka 2012
On 27 April, the team from the Moratuwa University, Team V360, emerged victorious at the Sri Lanka Finals of the Microsoft Imagine Cup 2012, held at the Sri Lanka Institute for Information Technology (SLIIT) Malabe.
The Imagine Cup is an annual student technology competition where student innovators around the world can harness their creativity and the power of technology to build groundbreaking, innovative solutions.
More than 700 students from 15 higher education institutes took part in the national competition this year. After receiving their awards from Microsoft Sri Lanka, the winner and the two runner-up teams will head to Australia to participate in Imagine Cup 2012 Worldwide Finals in July.
The winning team, Team V360, was selected from six semi-finalist teams. They presented their ideas to a lineup of judges that included Greg Young, CEO of Sri Lanka Telecom; Faiq Faaiz, Executive Vice President of Millennium Information Technologies; Padman De Silva, Chief Executive Officer of MS Technologies; and Imran Vilcassim, EPG Director of Microsoft Sri Lanka.
Comprising Thurupathan Vijayakumar, Malin De Silva and Rukshan Lakshitha Dangalle, Team V360 presented their winning project, “Back2Earth”, a technology that supports the 7th United Nations Millennium Development Goal: environmental sustainability. Their solution offers a one-of-a-kind interactive experience, creating awareness and enthusiasm by educating and actively engaging the public, encouraging them to contribute to environmental sustainability.
Microsoft Sri Lanka is one of the largest contributors towards enriching education in Sri Lanka. It was instrumental in introducing the “Software for the 21st Century” programme, which allows university students to gain access to the latest Microsoft software for free.
The Imagine Cup Grants Program, which is also organized by Microsoft, is a three-year, USD3 million competition to help students transform their ideas and their projects for businesses or non-profit organizations. These ideas aid communities that can benefit greatly from such technologies. The winning teams will also have the opportunity to collaborate with Microsoft to further develop and implement their plans.
The annual Imagine Cup has given students the opportunity to shine in a global arena, and apply what they had learned to real world problems. Through the competition, they were able to pick up useful skills and gain invaluable experience in a cross-cultural environment, ensuring their bright futures as entrepreneurs.