Marc, Gordon and the wonderful Pavilion assistants

This is my last evening in Hanover.

I visited Dean Yon’s store in the centre of Hanover. Dean is a South African who has lived in Germany for several years. His store in the Markthalle (which is something like a permanent Rosebank Flea Market) specializes in everything South African. He sells an amazing array of dozens of different South African wines, Simba Chips, Rooibos Tea and biltong. The seating area around his store was packed with people enjoying a bit of South Africa – and I was the only South African there (apart from Dean). It’s crowded like this every evening. As Dean says, “Germans love South African wine and anything else South African.”

As we enter the final day at CeBIT 2013, its time to reflect on the show and the success – or otherwise – of the SA National Pavilion.

It first must be said, loudly and clearly, that the dti and their team – Marc Müller, Gordon Gleimius, Mpati Mphela and Karin Liebenberg – did us proud. The unanimous opinion from both exhibitors and visitors is that the South African National Pavilion was magnificent. We could not have asked for anything better and all of us (including SA visitors to the pavilion like Dean Yon) felt extremely proud to be South Africans.

Some of the exhibitors on the Pavilion generated a great deal of interest and even signed some deals. For example, the holographic display from “Bottomline Interactive” and “Customer Care Solution” stood out as one of the highlights of the entire CeBIT show. Wiscor Technologies signed an MoU with the Russian Ministry of Education around their “traveling classroom” software. Without exception the companies on the SA Pavilion were pleased they had come to CeBIT, believed they have benefited and would aim to come again.

Exhibitors on our Pavilion said that coming to CeBIT had allowed them to see what other similar companies around the world were doing. It allowed them to see their products and service offerings within a broader international context. They also made contacts that could lead to future business benefits.

Without doubt CeBIT is a great show to come to. It may take place in Germany, but it is truly international and multi-faceted. Anything and everything that falls under the banner “ICT” from everywhere in the world will be found at CeBIT. Similarly visitors are not only German, or European. Based on visitors to our Pavilion I conclude that the only continent that is under-represented at CeBIT is Africa.

Against this background of success and happiness I do, however, have some negative thoughts. While all who participated in the National Pavilion benefited, did we bring the right companies? Also, did the companies that came benefit as much as they could have? My answer to both of these questions is “No”.

Not all of the companies on the Pavilion are “export ready”. When a company comes to CeBIT it should ideally have something that is tried, tested and ready to sell. It should be a company that has a strategy with some clear focus on international partnerships and markets. Before coming to CeBIT companies should do a great deal of preparation – book meetings, make lists of competitors and potential partners, print suitable leaflets, prepare websites, etc.

The dti has come to the party. It has invested a great deal of money and provided extremely generous incentives. I believe, however, that the SA ICT industry – individual companies, associations, and others – can and must do a whole lot more to achieve significant results from our participation at CeBIT. We need to work harder to find the right companies and prepare them for coming to CeBIT.

I often hear SA ICT companies complaining about Government’s lack of support for the sector. In CeBIT we have a clear example of significant Government support, and yet we struggle to find companies willing and ready to participate. With this in mind we must roll up our sleeves and start working now to ensure that CeBIT 2014 is an even bigger success for South Africa.

If you represent a company that could benefit from attending CeBIT, contact me at the JCSE, Eileen at the South African Electrotechnical Export Council (SAEEC), CITI/Silicon Cape, SmartExchange or the dti.

A day in the life of an exhibitor at CeBIT has three parts.

Early in the morning a few early risers sit at their stands dealing with emails or chatting with fellow exhibitors over their first mug of coffee for the day. There is a sense of calm before the storm, which comes just after 9am, when the gates of the show open for the day.

Between 9am and 6pm the day goes in waves. Visitors flow past like a never ending stream – CeBIT attracts more than 300,000 visitors each year from every corner of the world. As an exhibitor one fields questions, has pre-arranged meetings, and tries to slip off from time-to-time to grab some food or see something of CeBIT oneself.

At 6pm the gates of the show officially close for the day, and the parties and functions begin. Company stands and country pavilions are transformed as drinks and snacks are served to special customers and friends. In some cases live music drowns out conversations as exhibitors and visitors unwind and party late into the night.

Over the past few years the South African Pavilion has hosted one of the most popular and anticipated evening functions – a South African Wine Tasting. Everyone seems to LOVE our wine!  At 6pm on Day 3 our National Pavilion overflowed as hundreds of invited guests and their friends arrived to drink some (excellent) Cape wine and eat some (delicious) snacks. When I left at 7:40pm the party was still going strong! I don’t have the staying power of some of my fellow exhibitors!

Apart from the wine, the exhibit on our Pavilion that has attracted the most excitement is a transparent holographic colour display developed by “Bottomline Interactive” and “Customer Care Solutions”. A stylish white box sits on a plinth at eye level. Standing in front of the box you can see through clear glass panels on the front and back. Floating in the box is a 3-D image of a motorcar. The front panel is a touch screen. By moving your finger across this screen you can rotate the floating car. Another image that appears in the box is a black and white football. Yoram Nitzan, one of the developers of the system tells me that displaying pure black and white colours is a major innovation. Engineers from a major Korean electronics company visited our Pavilion to see this display and agreed that it was in some ways more advanced than anything they had.

While this holographic display certainly has the “wow factor”, other exhibitors on our Pavilion have seen a steady stream of interested visitors.

Pravin Maharaj and Avi Maharaj representing Wiscor

• Pilotfish Digital is a Durban-based software development company that has been to CeBIT before. It is a leading Microsoft-based integrator that specializes in developing solutions aimed at streamlining business processes for their clients.
• Qwix Technology has also been to CeBIT before. They offer a Warehouse Management System used by several major South African companies. Their solution includes several innovative features designed to automate and control material and inventory handling processes. The latest version of their software integrates with hand-held touchscreen devices resulting in a 100% paperless environment.
• GeoMed offers a range of healthcare technologies and medical devices. They have established partnerships with various academic and research institutions. One of the companies under the GeoMed umbrella is Mezzanine. It has become a market leader in the development of GSM enabled healthcare data collection and decision support systems for emerging market countries. Their platform has been deployed in Tanzania, Mozambique, Kenya, South Africa and India.
• SensePost has participated on the SA Pavilion at CeBIT several times before. Since it was founded in 2000 SensePost has become a significant global player in the information security space, providing skilled penetration assessment expertise to prestigious clients in Germany, UK, Switzerland, USA, Middle east and Africa. It has offices in London, Cape Town and Johannesburg.
• Thusa Dynamics is another Durban-based software development company represented at CeBIT by Tharun Pillay.  It has a focus within the travel industry. Thusa has also done work in the area of risk modeling and analysis for the SA Department of Defence, and in home automation and security.

Participating as part of the SA delegation at CeBIT has certainly opened my eyes to the range of innovative and exciting ICT products and services coming out of our country. Travelling to Germany to find this out has certainly been worth the effort!

Nithia Govender, Tjad Clark and Mohammed Badat at CeBIT 2013

As far as I see it there are two reasons to come to CeBIT – to meet people and to learn new things. On both of these accounts my second day at the world’s biggest ICT trade fair was hugely successful.

I spent some time today meeting exhibitors on the SA National Pavilion. (Isn’t it strange to travel thousands of kilometers to meet fellow South Africans!) There are 14 companies on the Pavilion, most of them are small and innovative with an eye on the future.

I asked some of them to tell me (briefly) what they do and why they’re here. This is what I found out:

• Korwe Software is based in Cape Town. It is represented at CeBIT by Nithia Govender and Tjad Clark. They are launching a new product at CeBIT – a “context engine” that helps mobile users filter information based on their position and other preferences. For example, a vegetarian traveller in Hanover searching for the closest restaurant on her cell phone would get different suggestions compared to her meat-eating companion.
• Wiscor Technologies is from Durban. It’s part of the “Oval Group” who is very active in the tertiary education space. Wiscor’s main offering is “Infiniti Place 2.0” which is a “travelling classroom”. It gives students access to e-lectures, e-books, e-dictionaries and YouTube videos. Wiscor’s software systems satisfy all of the reporting requirements for the SA Council for Higher Education. Pravin Maharaj and Avi Maharaj are representing Wiscor on the National Pavilion at CeBIT.
• “invirohub” is a smart energy monitoring solution. It integrates any compliant smart-meter, energy monitoring and leak detection products into a system that has been used by utilities, municipalities, commercial properties and light industrial clients. Lance Manala is representing the company at CeBIT.
• Mohammed Badat is the CEO of MyVoip Communications. This is his company’s fourth visit to CeBIT. They first came in 2007. MyVoip has an innovative “School Diary” product. They also support clients in implementing SOA-based integration of various systems.

I asked all of these exhibitors whether it was worthwhile coming to CeBIT and if they thought the SA National Pavilion was of value to them. Without exception they all felt coming to CeBIT made good business sense. Lance (from invirohub) said that with help from the CeBIT organisers he had targeted particular companies from all over the world who were offering similar solutions to his. He was able to visit them and learn about what they were doing. This has given him really valuable strategic insights into how he could develop his product in the future.

Pravin Maharaj believes that South Africa’s involvement at CeBIT could be much more effective and valuable if more preparatory work was done beforehand. He makes the interesting point that it is not up to the dti to do this preparation. Companies coming to CeBIT and the SA ICT sector generally need to take responsibility to develop a strategy and marketing material that will enhance our participation at CeBIT.

Watching the comings and goings on the Pavilion and having tens of conversations myself I have no doubt that having a substantial presence at CeBIT is good for the SA ICT Industry and for each of the exhibitors on our Pavilion.

My own personal Day 1 at CeBIT ended on a low … I walked 2 km through a cold Hanover evening to find somewhere (anywhere) that was screening the Manchester United vs Real Madrid game. Found it at “Tom’s Bowling Alley” on a channel that hopped irritatingly between the Man U game and another one involving Dortmund. I gave up at half-time – didn’t see the controversial referee’s decision that resulted in my team being knocked out of the Champion’s League.

Anyhow – none of this has anything to do with CeBIT!

Before I left the South African Pavilion yesterday afternoon I was interviewed by Sudi Mnette for the Swahili service of “Deutsche Welle” – the German radio station. He was puzzled that there seems to be no African countries represented at CeBIT. He was very excited to see South Africa here and asked me a lot of questions about ICT in Africa. I stressed the importance of mobile technology and how it is spreading like a bush-fire through our continent. My conversation with Sudi left me feeling that a stronger African presence at future CeBITs would add a lot to the picture of the international ICT industry that emerges from the event.

Part of my intention in writing this blog is to explore whether participation in CeBIT adds value to the South African ICT sector. I spoke to some of the exhibitors on the SA Pavilion yesterday about this.

Kees Snijders is here for the first time. His company “Flickswitch” has been in business for just over 5 years. Their main product, called “SIMcontrol”, is a web-based system that allows companies and organisations with large numbers of pre-paid SIM cards in the field to manage them.

Flickswitch has built a thriving business around this technology. They employ 7 people, operate from offices in Cape Town and Joburg, have 300 customers and an annual turnover of R15million. Kees is at CeBIT to look for potential partners that would help Flickswitch expand into Africa, Europe and elsewhere. This is the first time he has participated in one of the dti incentive programmes and has – so far – been impressed. He thinks the SA Pavilion is magnificent. He has also found that there is great value in walking around CeBIT – seeing what other companies are doing and getting a sense of what’s out there. He would definitely want to come back in future years.

Another CeBIT first-timer is Tsakane Shilubane. Her company “Shiluba Tsaka Productive” offers IT support services and software development. She is using CeBIT to gain a deeper understanding of the international IT scene and to look for partners and investors. She will definitely come back next year. She feels that having been at CeBIT for the first time will allow her to prepare better for future visits.

And as for my overall impressions so far – walking around some of the exhibition halls yesterday I’m SO impressed at how wonderful the South African National Pavilion is!! It is definitely one of the best around. The dti have done our country and our industry proud!!

Chancellor Merkel Opens Polish Pavilion at CeBIT 2013

by Prof Barry Dwolatzky

I’m back at CeBIT. I was last here in 2010 – and it’s really exciting to be back!

CeBIT is the largest international ICT trade fair in the world. It happens in Hanover, Germany, in March every year. Over the past few years the SA ICT Sector has been fortunate enough to have a South African National Pavilion at CeBIT – sponsored by the Department of Trade and Industry (the dti).

I’m at CeBIT representing the SA Electrotechnical Export Council (SAEEC). I will be providing “industry expert” support to the dti staff and the 14 South African companies represented on the Pavilion.

Day 1 of the show has just started. Our Pavilion in Hall 6 is next to the Polish Pavilion. Poland is the “Partner Country” at CeBIT in 2013, and a few minutes ago the German Chancellor, Angela Merkel, and the Polish Prime Minister opened the Polish Pavilion. Having two heads of state coming to CeBIT is evidence that this trade fair carries significant clout.

The size and scale of CeBIT is something that needs to be seen to be appreciated. The venue in Hanover – called “Messe” – is one of Europe’s largest show grounds. There are something like 26 Halls each covering 1000’s of square meters. More that half the Halls at Messe are used for CeBIT.

The South Africa Pavilion is beautiful this year. Its bright yellow and open and covers 300 square meters.  But ….

Is it worthwhile?  Does it make sense to have a National Pavilion? Does it add value for the SA companies represented here? Does it bring benefits to the SA ICT sector? If you aren’t  here this year, should you try to be here next year?

Over the next few days I will use my blog to try to capture some of my impressions of CeBIT 2013. I will also try to answer the questions  I’ve just asked.

Paul Graham is an American programmer, investor and writer. In 2006 he wrote an article entitled “How to be Silicon Valley” (http://www.paulgraham.com/siliconvalley.html). In his article he suggests that “What it takes is the right people”. He says that to establish a “Silicon Valley” you need two types of people in sufficient numbers – “nerds and rich people”. The “nerds” bring the creative energy, the ideas and the technical expertise upon which startups are created. The “rich people” are investors willing to provide the funding.

He goes on to describe how Silicon Valley in Northern California emerged as a hub for startup activity in the late 1970’s. The “nerds” came from some of the world’s top universities – Stanford, Berkley and others – in the Silicon Valley area. Many of the “rich people” were folk who had made their fortunes by setting up startups of their own in Silicon Valley.

According to Paul Graham, creating a Silicon Valley-type of hub in another part of the world requires the following:

• one or more good universities (a source of “nerds”),
• a living and working environment that is attractive to the “nerds” (to keep them in the area)
• a ready supply of wealthy people willing to invest in risky startups.

With these thoughts in mind, where in South Africa could we hope to see our own Silicon Valley emerge?  I guess that the knee-jerk answer is Cape Town. After all it has good universities and a beautiful natural environment dominated by the sea, the mountain and delicious Cape wine …. I have my doubts, however.

Without wishing to detract from the obvious advantages of Cape Town as South Africa’s ICT hub, I want to draw your attention to another part of our country – namely Braamfontein in central Johannesburg. I think that it has many advantages over Cape Town and anywhere else in South Africa. What has Braamfontein got going for it?

Firstly it is already an important hub at the centre of Africa’s richest region. Gauteng accounts for 40% of South Africa’s GDP. Most of this wealth is concentrated in a 10km circle stretching from the Joburg CBD to Sandton. Braamfontein is near the centre of this circle.

Braamfontein, and its immediate surroundings, is an educational, government and business hub. It is the home of two major universities (Wits and UJ), three of the four big banks (FNB, Standard and ABSA), the administrative centres of both the City of Johannesburg and Gauteng Province and major corporations such as Liberty Life, SAB Miller, Anglo American, Transnet and others. It is also a transport hub with South Africa’s largest mini-bus taxi rank, railway stations (Metrorail, Gautrain and national), bus routes and motorways (M1 and M2).

Over recent years Braamfontein has also begun to develop into an exciting and vibrant entertainment and cultural centre. There are music venues, theatres, bars and restaurants, a weekend market, the new Wits University Art Museum, and lots of new housing developments targeting students and young professionals.

The beginning of a software innovation hub is also taking shape in Braamfontein. Wits University’s Joburg Centre for Software Engineering (JCSE) and Digital Arts Centre are on the Wits East Campus. Thoughtworks, the innovative American software company, has set up shop in Braamfontein. There are also plans for IBM to establish its South African “Skills Development and Research Institute” at Wits.

Given all of this I believe that its time to take Braamfontein more seriously. It is a strong candidate to become Africa’s Silicon Valley. I believe in it – watch this space!!

Software Methods are like a fashion show

Software Engineer #1:  What methodology are you using these days?

Software Engineer #2:  We’re into Lean in a big way …. with a few XP practices thrown into the mix. We were very into Scrum last year, but then I read this amazing book and really got hooked on Lean.

SE #1: I remember the arguments we used to have a few years ago. You tried to convince me that Agile was a recipe for disaster. I think you were very keen on RUP at the time.

SE #2: That’s right. I was very young and immature then. I’ve got a much deeper understanding now of how software development really works, and I have absolutely no doubt that Lean and Kanban have all the answers for me.

Does this conversation sound familiar to you?  Ivar Jacobson, one of the world’s leading software engineering practices and methods gurus, has said that software development looks like a fashion industry.  It’s not that most of the methodologies we’ve seen coming and going over the past few decades are bad. They all have very sound practices and advice that can be incredibly useful to software engineers.

Jacobson, and several other prominent experts believe that Software Engineering (SE) is “gravely hampered today by immature practices”. They list some specific problems as:

• The lack of a sound, widely accepted theoretical basis.
• The huge number of methods and method variants, with differences little understood and artificially magnified.
• The lack of credible experimental evaluation and validation.
• The split between industry practice and academic research.

With this in mind Jacobson, Bertrand Meyer (famous for the OO language Eiffel and the concept of “design-by-contract”) and Richard Soley (CEO of the Object Management Group (OMG) ) established an initiative in September 2009 called “SEMAT”( = Software Engineering Method and Theory). Supporters of the initiative have signed a declaration – somewhat reminiscent of the famous Agile Manifesto – that says the following:

“We support a process to refound software engineering based on a solid theory, proven principles and best practices that:

• Include a kernel of widely-agreed elements, extensible for specific uses
• Addresses both technology and people issues
• Are supported by industry, academia, researchers and users
• Support extension in the face of changing requirements and technology”

Over the past two years a great deal of work has been carried out on defining the “kernel of widely-agreed elements”.  This will soon appear in a new book by Ivar Jacobson and others. It holds out the promise of fundamentally changing the discipline of software engineering.

If you’re interested in any of this you can find out a lot more by visiting the SEMAT website (www.semat.org). You can even become a signatory of the SEMAT declaration on the website.  Better still you can hear Ivar Jacobson speak about SEMAT and other interesting topics  in Johannesburg or Cape Town (between 7^th and 11^th May 2012) when he visits South Africa as the 2012 “JCSE Distinguished International Lecturer” (details on www.jcse.org.za).  On the evening of Tuesday 8^th May a South African Chapter of SEMAT is to be launched at Wits University (again look on www.jcse.org.za for details).

You’re reversing your car when, suddenly, you hear a loud crunch as you drive over something. You stop, jump out and run to see what you’ve hit. It’s your 5-year-old daughter’s tricycle crushed under your back wheel. Someone must have left it in the driveway yesterday. What do you do next?

a) Feel extremely relieved that your daughter wasn’t sitting on the tricycle when it got crushed under your car …. and then forget all about the incident;

b) Feel irritated that you’ll now have to buy another tricycle … and then forget all about the incident;

c) Feel angry that the tricycle was left in the driveway … and then forget all about the incident;

d) Spend the rest of the day thinking about how it could have happened that you reversed over a child’s tricycle (with or without a child on it). You analyse your routine, you think about precautions you will take in the future and you get your family together to discuss how a similar incident can be avoided in future.

To be honest I probably fall into category a), b) or c).  I would probably think, “thank heaven’s no one got hurt!” and then forget about it. Life is busy and who has time to worry about what might have happened.

I met someone recently who definitely falls into category d). His name is Ted Keller and he worked for IBM as the software quality manager on NASA’s Space Shuttle programme. Before each Shuttle launch a number of senior managers were required to sign a form certifying that the launch could proceed. In signing this form Ted Keller was making a very specific and terrifying statement. He was formally certifying that the Shuttle’s software was 100% correct and free of defects and errors. As he says, “Anyone who knows anything about large and complex software systems would probably have to be an idiot to make such a statement.” Not only was Ted Keller’s professional reputation on the line every time he signed the “Flight Readiness” certificate – he was also accepting responsibility for a $4 billion space vehicle and the lives of 7 astronauts, many of whom were his personal friends and neighbours.

How did Keller feel confident enough to sign the “Flight Readiness” form time after time? He attributes his faith in the Shuttle software to two things: (i) the capability and dedication of the team of software engineers who developed it, and (ii) the processes they followed to ensure that everything humanly possible had been done to ensure quality. Every time a defect was detected in software testing, causes were analysed and processes were changed to ensure that the same error never occurred again – category d) in the tricycle example. And it paid off. The Space Shuttle flew for 30 years and did not experience a single mission critical software defect. Keller’s confidence in his software was justified.

I met Ted Keller last week at the SEPG North America Conference in Albuquerque, USA, where he presented a really interesting paper. He spoke about his frustrations and successes in bringing the lessons learnt on the Shuttle programme to other domains. On leaving the Shuttle programme Keller began working as a consultant trying to convince software product companies, banks and others engaged in software development that they should follow NASA’s lead in developing high quality software. To his surprise managers and developers showed very little enthusiasm for the message he brought. In their domains quality just had to be “good enough”.

Over time Keller has changed his approach. He now begins by understanding the “pain points” experienced by software developers and their managers. While, in the case of the Shuttle, defect free software was the key business goal, other domains have their own business drivers.  These may include getting a product to market quickly, keeping a project within budget, or eliminating the need for team members to work overtime. In each case Keller has been able to draw on the lessons he learnt working on the Shuttle and come up with a process improvement strategy that helps an organization eliminate its specific pain points.

He listed the following as some of the lessons he has learnt over his long and distinguished career:

1. Don’t treat process improvement as a “textbook” activity. Textbooks provide guidance but DO NOT teach how to improve processes for any real world situation.
2. “Process tailoring” has evolved to “process crafting” to create a process improvement method that is appropriate to a specific organization.
3. It is important to understand which aspects of the organization’s performance can be changed. “Traditional” parameters such as cost, quality and even the skills of workers may not be alterable. Restrictions on education, population, time, materials, workable hours, travel, schedules, etc. can limit or prevent many “text-book” process improvement activities.
4. Before starting on a process improvement journey one should make certain of senior executives support.  It is not always true or obvious that there will be a positive ROI or that any financial benefit can be realized soon enough to justify the impacts and perceived risk to the business.
5. One of the most successful approaches to achieve process improvement buy-in and stakeholder participation (with or without Executive endorsement) is to build and advertise the intent as a remedy for serious “pain points” being experienced by the stakeholders.

In summary Ted Keller is not an advocate of textbook process improvement but recommends an agile, flexible and pragmatic approach. This is interesting and somewhat surprising coming from the man who successfully shaped the software development processes at the heart of the Shuttle programme.

Welcome back to my blog. It has a fresh look and I hope you will follow me and share your comments in the year ahead.

In May 2000 the Economist magazine labelled Africa “The hopeless continent”. In December 2011 the same magazine featured an article entitled “The hopeful continent: Africa Rising”  (View the article) . This dramatic U-turn by the Economist put a smile on my face. I’ve never doubted the incredible potential of the continent on which I live. Did you? Now we are seeing that potential being translated into high growth rates and thriving economies.

But … as I shake off the beach sand and get my head back into gear for a busy 2012 I am starting to think of the challenges that lie ahead in the coming years.

Both in South Africa and throughout Africa the successful future forecast by the Economist is not assured. A great deal of hard work needs to be done. Challenges include infrastructure, health, education, political and economic stability … and many more. Somewhere within each of these challenges is Information and Communication Technology (ICT) – the key factor that underpins modern economic and social life.

Africa’s ICT sector needs to rise to the challenge of supporting growth and development on our continent.

As I sit at my desk drawing up plans, strategies and to-do lists for the year ahead … (Gosh!  Its already February and I’m still planning! ) … I find myself feeling really excited. All of us – the Software Engineering and ICT community of Africa – have a wonderful opportunity to rise to the challenge to ensure that Africa keeps on Rising!

I think that I’m ready to make my contribution. Are you ready?

Barry Dwolatzky with the Taiwan Team

Imagine Cup 2011 has come to an end.  It was a truly incredible experience to be part of it. The award ceremony was held in the famous Koch Theatre at New York’s Lincoln Centre. Being in that theatre surrounded by the energy and enthusiasm flowing from 400 excited students was truly amazing.

I took the opportunity before the awards to view some of the projects and chat to several of the competitors. While the quality and sophistication of the entries varied widely, every single student I spoke to was filled with a deeply held belief that they could and would change the world. Maybe they will … or maybe they won’t – it’s not really important. What is important is that they all have vision and ambition! I guess that’s what Imagine Cup really achieved.

A bunch of young software developers from around the world learnt to see themselves as masters of their own future. Anyone who works as a teacher in a University – as I have for the past 22 years – will understand that this is why we do what we do.

I take my hat off to Microsoft for running this unique student competition. I’m sure that the benefits are hard to track in Dollars or Rands, but the effect that this event has on the hundreds of students who come to the finals – and the software industry they will soon be working in – are substantial.

So – back to the Awards. The Mayor of New York, Michael Bloomburg, and a host of other dignitaries were there. The music was loud, the atmosphere was electric. There are, in fact, 7 competitions in Imagine Cup.  These include Game Design, Embedded Systems and Interoperability. The “big one” however is Software Design.

From the 67 entries 6 finalists were selected – USA, China, New Zealand, Ireland, Jordan and Romania. Places 1,2 and 3 went to Ireland, USA and Jordan in that order.  The winning team from Ireland developed a system that is installed in the car of a young driver. It aims to encourage him/her to drive safely – thus reducing accidents. It monitors how the driver behaves and if he/she is reckless or dangerous the system reports this to the owner of the car (presumably the parent) via sms.

So – the winner is …. Who? Is it the team from Ireland? Is it Microsoft? Or is it the software industry as a whole? I vote for the latter!

My challenge now to my colleagues in SA Universities is this: let’s encourage our students to compete and let’s send the WINNING team to Imagine Cup 2012. It will be held in Sydney, Australia.  I hope I’m there.