Nokia announces final winners of global Calling...
Corporate news announcement processed and transmitted by Hugin AS.
The issuer is solely responsible for the content of this
announcement.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
--------------
Next round of contest offers cash prizes and spotlight placement of
winning applications in Nokia's new Ovi Store
Barcelona, Spain - Forum Nokia today announced the final winners in
its global Calling All Innovators contest for mobile applications and
solutions to help improve the quality of life on the planet, and
issued a call for a new round of compelling mobile application
submissions in the competition's next phase.
The winners were honored at the Forum Nokia Calling All Innovators
Award Ceremony during the annual GSMA Mobile World Congress, and were
selected from among nearly 1,000 developers who competed in
Eco-Challenge, Emerging Markets and Technology Showcase categories
with mobile applications designed to contribute toward building a
better world.
The next phase of Calling All Innovators announced today in Barcelona
challenges mobile and web application developers worldwide to submit
best-of-breed applications in three categories: Internet Innovation,
Flash, and Emerging Markets. Prizes include cash, the opportunity to
demo at Nokia World in September, and Spotlight placement of their
winning application in Nokia's newly announced Ovi Store.
Challenged to create applications to improve the quality of life
around the world, the grand prize winners of Calling All Innovators
are: GreenDrive by Road-Guard (Israel), in the Eco-Challenge
category; Nano Ganesh by Santosh Ostwal (India), in the Emerging
Markets category; and X Dancery by Simlife Ltd. (China), in the
Technology Showcase category.
Each of the grand prize winners received a cash award of USD 25,000
and will receive help in distributing their mobile applications to
consumers worldwide. First place winners in each category received
USD 10,000, and second-place winners each received USD 5,000.
"The high caliber of these nine winners in the first iteration of
Calling All Innovators underscores the remarkable, ongoing creativity
and innovation that currently defines the mobile developer community
around the globe," said Rob Taylor, Director of Forum Nokia. "In the
next phase of Calling All Innovators, Forum Nokia challenges
developers to help further drive the enhanced use of mobile devices
in real-world scenarios with truly innovative applications and
services that are designed specifically for the Nokia N97, built with
Flash technology, or specifically targeted at users in Emerging
Markets worldwide."
During the first round of Calling All Innovators, nearly 250,000
unique visitors and more than 12,000 developers from around the world
registered with Forum Nokia, the world's largest mobile developer
community.
The nearly 1,000 developers from 57 countries who submitted mobile
applications were narrowed to 11 finalists in January, with a panel
of judges selecting the final winners in each of the following
categories:
ECO-Challenge: Applications or solutions to minimize mobility's
global environmental impact and enable consumers to make sustainable
lifestyle choices that reduce their energy consumption and carbon
footprint.
- Grand Prize: GreenDrive (Israel) - An application that promotes
vehicular fuel efficiency by sensing current and impending road
conditions that influence fuel consumption and providing real-time
driving directions for the shortest route in the quickest time
legally allowable.
- 1st Place: TigerMap (China) - An eco-friendly city guide
application that makes choosing public transportation easier,
combining up-to-the-minute mass transit information with
recommendations of the best restaurants, entertainment, hotels and
shopping in more than 150 cities throughout China.
- 2nd Place: Ticketek Mobile Ticketing (Argentina) - A Series 40 and
S60 Java electronic-ticketing application that reduces paper
consumption by allowing consumers to use a barcode stored on their
phone to gain admission to events.
- Runner-up: Green Phone (India) - An S60 application maximizing
battery life through improved regulation of device backlight, WLAN,
Bluetooth and charger power consumption.
Emerging Markets: New mobile solutions to improve the daily lives of
millions in developing nations, focused on areas such as education,
health data access, infotainment and agriculture.
- Grand Prize: Nano Ganesh (India) - This application allows farmers
in India to establish remote contact with distant, modem-equipped
electric irrigation pumps , to check on power supply and pump
operation without the need to travel long distances .
- 1st Place: mPedigree (Ghana) - This application allows users to
text-message at no cost a quality-authentication code found on the
packaging of anti-Malarial and other medications to a provisioned
mobile shortcode in order to guard against counterfeit drugs believed
to be responsible for an alarming number of deaths, especially in the
developing world.
- 2nd Place: DigitallCS (Digital Internal Control System) (Mexico) -
With this application, agricultural co-ops can inspect the growing
practices of their members and upload the data to a website for
reporting and analysis in order to verify the growers' adherence to
standards that include Fair Trade Certified and Certified Organic.
Technology Showcase: Applications using Flash Lite, Java, Python,
open source or other technologies supported by Series 40 or S60
devices that create a compelling end-user experience for individuals
or communities:
- Grand Prize: X Dancery (China) - This application, fully optimized
for the S60 5th Edition's touchscreen UI and motion sensor
technology, and with advanced 3D-graphics rendering capabilities,
analyzes any MP3 file to automatically generate a unique tempo-based
game for each selected musical track.
- 1st Place: kReader Mobile (U.S.) - This multi-language
text-to-speech application with cross-language translation
capabilities uses the camera phone to digitize any book, letter,
receipt or other printed document and translate the captured text
into audio that is "read" back to the user.
- 2nd Place: Neuscreen (Thailand) - This application utilizes the
drawing, touch-screen and camera functionalities of a Nokia N95
device connected to a normal television set to track the motion of a
pen light and enable "virtual" drawing, as well as projection and
manipulation directly on the TV screen of images stored on the mobile
device.
- Runner-up: PhotoMap (Germany) - This application digitizes and
stores a photograph of any fixed public map taken with a camera phone
for easy access, browsing and geo-referencing on the mobile device.
In the next round of Calling All Innovators, Forum Nokia is
challenging developers to create applications that will enhance the
use of mobile devices in real-world scenarios, in the following
categories:
- Internet Innovation - Calling on web developers to transform
consumer-focused ideas into real applications on Nokia devices using
technologies that include Nokia Web Runtime, XHTML, CSS, Java Script,
AJAX, widgets and other standards-based web technologies.
- Flash - Challenging creative developers and designers to build
compelling applications that expand the capabilities and user
benefits of Flash Lite on Nokia S60 devices.
- Emerging Markets - Urging developers to create innovative
applications across mobile technology platforms - ranging from SMS
through Series 40 and S60 device platforms - in order to meet the
needs and improve the daily lives of millions living in rural and
semi-urban areas worldwide.
The "Internet Innovation" category is being conducted in tandem with
Nokia's Widget Design Competition, which invites consumers to submit
their best ideas for new widgets to be featured in Nokia's newly
announced Ovi Store. The winning designer will receive a Nokia N97
pre-loaded with a working version of the winning widget. Winning
widget ideas will be announced in March, and those ideas will be made
available to an elite group of developers to compete face-to-face at
the Nokia N97 Calling All Innovators "Hackathon" during the Nokia
Developers' Summit in Monaco on 28 - 29 April 2009.
Application submissions will remain open through 30 June, at
www.callingallinnovators.com, with regional finalists announced on 15
August. The grand prize winners in each category will be announced at
Nokia World in September.
More information about the grand prize winners of Forum Nokia's
Calling All Innovators contest can be found online at
www.callingallinnovators.com.
The launch of the next Calling All Innovators competition, including
complete guidelines and rules for the three new categories, will be
available on the contest website starting on 13 March 2009.
About Forum Nokia
Nokia's global developer program, Forum Nokia connects developers to
tools, technical information, support, and distribution channels they
can use to build and market applications around the globe. From
offices in the U.S., Europe, India, Japan, China, and Singapore,
Forum Nokia provides technical and business development support to
developers and operators to assist them in achieving their goal of
successfully launching applications and services to consumers and
enterprises. More information is available at www.forum.nokia.com.
About Nokia
Nokia is the world leader in mobility, driving the transformation and
growth of the converging Internet and communications industries. We
make a wide range of mobile devices with services and software that
enable people to experience music, navigation, video, television,
imaging, games, business mobility and more. Developing and growing
our offering of consumer Internet services, as well as our enterprise
solutions and software, is a key area of focus. We also provide
equipment, solutions and services for communications networks through
Nokia Siemens Networks.
Media Enquiries:
Nokia Communications
Tel. +358 7180 34900
Email: press.services@nokia.com
www.nokia.com
--- End of Message ---
NOKIA
P.O. Box 226<br>FIN-00045 NOKIA GROUP Espoo
WKN: 870737;
ISIN: FI0009000681; Index: DJ STOXX Large 200, DJ STOXX 50;
Listed: Nordic list (Large Cap) in THE HELSINKI STOCK EXCHANGE;