This years awards reportedly recieved more entries than ever before, all of which are of an extremely high calibre. This is an indication to the innovative work that has taken place in Africa over the past 12 months.
Helios Towers Africa - Shared Telecoms Infrastructure
Orange Group - Deezer
Sicap - Mobile Money ATM
ZTE - Solution for Airtel
Viettel - Movitel Rural Network
Comtech EF Data - Mobile Backhaul Solution
Prezence Digital - #Mandelastory
Etisalat Misr - Smart Device
WIOCC - Seamless, High-Capacity International Connectivity Ring around Africa
Bozza Mobile - The Bozza.mobi App
Alan Knott-Craig - Cell C
Safaricom - DAKTARI-1525
To celebrate the launch of AfricApps at AfricaCom 2012, the winning entrants of the App-focused awards were:
Prezence Digital - Ster-Kinekor mobile app
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Following the first edition in 2011, the Orange African Social Venture Prize has been awarded to three entrepreneurs or start-ups offering solutions that use ICT in innovative ways to meet the needs of people living in Africa.
The panel of judges, consisting of Orange specialists, the media and institutions that promote development, chose the three prize-winners from among almost 450 candidate projects covering a variety of fields such as healthcare, agriculture, education, energy, industry and commerce illustrating the high potential of telecommunications for development in Africa.
The winning projects are:
The 'Etisalat Nigeria Prize for Innovation' seeks to promote the utilisation of mobile broadbansd in Africa. The inaugural 'Etisalat Prize for Innovation is aimed at encouraging and celebrating valuable innovation in the African market and will awarded in two categories. The first prize of $25 000 for the most innovative product or service launched in the last 12 months and a second prize of $10 000 for the most innovative idea.
Etisalat believes innovation should go beyond improvements in existing products and services and instead have real valuable social or economic impact to customers.
The winner of first prize was Mobile Maths Practice, a mobile application to help students around the globe prepare for maths exams. The invention relates to wireless communications and methods and systems in which a wireless service provider may offer wireless data messages to mobile subscribers.
Second place went to iConnect Project, which supplies mobile broadband internet connection vehicles to schools in a variety of geo-locations. The vehicles are refurbished shipping containers connected to a truck head and are fully mobile and are therefore scheduled into a school's timetable which enables sharing and full connectivity.
Speaking on the success of the competition which witnessed an impressive array of entries for the two award categories, chief executive officer of Etisalat Nigeria, Steven Evans, explained that the competition was instituted to provide the opportunity for innovative and relevant mobile broadband products/services and ideas.
"We are delighted at the creativity shown by all the entries and this is a clear indication of the importance of broadband in Africa. Innovative broadband projects, products and services have improved the way we live and work and so we launched this award because we realise the importance of broadband in the industry. Innovation is core to our business strategy at Etisalat Nigeria and we see ourselves as a young and innovative business setting the pace for others in the Nigerian telecommunications industry" said Evans.