Team Bit Shifters triumphs in Imagine Cup UK 2005 Software Design Final
The Microsoft UK Academic Team is pleased to announce that Team Bit Shifters has just triumphed at Tuesday’s Imagine Cup UK 2005 Software Design Final.
28 July 2005
We would like to say a huge thank you to all of the sponsors, judges, our events
management agency BBL and especially May Dean, Nikki Matthias and Amanda Glasgow,
the video crew from Bubble Solutions, Inferno our PR agency and all of our Microsoft
VIPs, hosts and helpers – David Burrows, Matt Bishop, Peter Bell, Ian Erridge,
Chris Bright, Des O’Carroll, Daren Mancini, Jos de Bresser, Richard Horsfield,
Geoff Hughes, Mark Richardson, James Blamey, Jackie Nixon, Chris Ferris, Oli Messenger
and Steve Abrams – for all of their support and help to make this year’s competition
such a success.
Team Bit Shifters comprising three Microsoft Student Interns; Adrian Collier from the University of Bournemouth, Andrew Webber from City University in London and Joseph Wardell from the University of Wales, Aberystwyth beat off seven other teams in the
final event held at the BT Tower in central London on June 21st.
Their application, OneReach, enables gap-year students to blog their journey and experiences from anywhere in the world from their smartphone. Parents and friends at home can view their progress, their blogs, pictures, and videos on a website and keep in contact with them. OneReach is designed to enhance the gap-year travelling experience; sharing it with parents and friends and also facilitating community interaction with fellow gap-year travellers around the globe.
This year’s event was sponsored by BT in association with Capgemini and 3i and was held at the stunning BT Tower in central London. Now largely closed
to the public, we are particularly grateful to BT for providing us with the use
of this towering landmark as the venue for the Imagine Cup; we are also grateful
to Capgemini for funding the travel costs for the winning team to travel to Yokohoma
and are grateful to 3i who will be organising a one day venture capital workshop
in September as a prize for all of the finalists.
The 8 finalists included 6 Microsoft Student Partners and were selected from an original shortlist of over 30 teams from over 40 different universities across the UK.
Each team presented to a panel of 7 business and technology experts which included
Andrew Herbert from Microsoft Research, Joe Black and Ian Rosarius from BT, Bradley
Tipp from Capgemini, Ben Gales from 3i, Mark Quirk, Microsoft DPE and Ian Pearshouse
from the University of Birmingham.
Each team then showcased their application to a mix of VIPs from Microsoft, Capgemini, 3i and BT as well as a mix of developer and education press and university lecturers.
The team will now be heading off to Yokohoma, Japan at the end of July and we
wish Adrian, Andrew and Jo, the very best of luck as they represent the UK at
the worldwide finals.
A Selection of Press Coverage Received to Date
- Andrew Webber, Team Bit Shifters
- Jo Wardell, Team Bit Shifters
- Antranik Kasparian, Team Genesys Innovations
- Paul O’Neill, Team Babbage
- Luke Smith, Team Babbage
- Philip Stears, Team Puto
- Rob Miles, lecturer at the University of Hull
- IanPearshouse, judge from the University of Birmingham
On behalf of all the Microsoft Academic Team - Kevin, Caroline, Mark, AndySt, Andy Si, Chris.
