UNDER the patronage of Tareq Kamel, the Egyptian Minister of Communications and Information Technology and in co-operation with the Information Technology Industry Development Agency (ITIDA), Nokia and Etisalat Misr have recently announced their joint developer competition “Calling All Innovators Bilmasry”. The competition challenges Egyptian mobile and web application to submit locally relevant applications and content for use on Nokia devices for Egyptian consumers. This first of its kind mobile competition for Egypt offers special prizes with a total value of 800,000 dollars. The best entry by a developer based in Egypt will receive a prize of 30,000 dollars in cash. Additionally, two runners- up will get 15,000 dollars in cash and 5,000 dollars in cash respectively. In addition, the winners will be admitted into ITIDA's incubation programme, is worth 250,000 dollars per winner over a period of two years (in co-ordination with ITIDA rules and regulations). Developers are asked to create an application, a piece of content, or a Web Runtime widget that is relevant to the Egyptian market. The application can be in Arabic or in English. Submissions from developers for the 2010 “Calling All Innovators ��" Bilmasry” being announced by September 2010. Criteria for choosing the winners include quality and functionality; uniqueness and innovativeness; usability and creativity; and ability to fulfil users' needs in terms of relevancy and customer adoption. Finalists in this local competition will automatically qualify for the global Calling All Innovators contest. On this occasion, Eddy Rizk, Nokia's General Manager for North Africa, commented: “We believe that we achieved key objectives of starting to build a developer ecosystem in the region. I have seen a significant level of interest in a similar competition that Nokia launched last summer demonstrating to us the great potential in this region and Egypt in particular. We all need to maintain this great momentum and further encourage it with similar initiatives and partnerships." “Today, this partnership with Etisalat, one of the largest mobile operators in the region, will definitely help this activity to grow from strength to strength as we continue to engage with all of the developers to continue to bring relevant, useful and most important of all high-quality applications and solutions to our consumers,” added Rizk. Meanwhile, Sherif Amin, the Director of Products and Services at Etisalat, said: "This partnership with Nokia emphasises our commitment to reach out to our customers and communities here in Egypt. Together, we are challenging Egyptian developers to create various local tools that make a positive impact. Whether it is someone new to mobile or an experienced coder, this joined initiative is offering new opportunities for local developers to grow their business.” Additionally, Nokia has teamed up with ITIDA, to give guidance during the judging process and work with select developers to further enhance relevant projects. "We are looking for creators who can bring a fresh perspective and local knowledge to the growing field of mobile applications. Our goal is to find some partners with whom we can work to extend the power of ITIDA to new platforms that would enable us to achieve our goal of developing the IT industry in Egypt," explained Hazem Abdelazim, the CEO for ITIDA. This initiative is part of the Global Nokia launch of “Calling All Innovators 2010”, an international application development contest with five categories for submissions that enhance the use of Nokia mobile devices in real-world scenarios and inspire creativity and change. Submissions are accepted from March 28, 2010 until June 10, 2010, with winners being announced by September 2010. More information about Nokia's Calling All Innovators “Bilmasry”, including how to submit an application and complete contest rules and requirements, can be found online at http://www.callingallinnovators. com/bilmasry
