The Imagine Cup Innovation Competition is a global contest for the best new innovative software and the winning team will take home $50,000 (US). Create a desktop or tablet project using Windows, or a mobile project using Windows Phone, or a browser project using Windows Azure and you could win big at the Imagine Cup World Finals in Seattle 2015.
If you’ve got a great idea, assemble a great team and work hard to bring that idea to life. Your project could be on devices all over the world, changing lives and giving people the thrill of seeing the future come to life right in front of them.
As a student, you can obtain free tools and software at DreamSpark.
Prizes:
Round 1:
- Each National Final competition may offer prizes at the discretion of the local Microsoft subsidiary operating that competition. The existence, nature, and conditions of such prizes are subject to the rules of each National Final.
Round 2:
- Every World Semifinalist team who advances to round 3 will receive a trip to the Imagine Cup 2015 Worldwide Finals in Seattle, Washington, USA, in July, 2015, to compete at the World Finals.
- Trip includes round trip coach airfare from a major airport closest to each competitor’s home, standard hotel accommodations, and select meals and activities.
- Associates to the team are not eligible for this travel prize.
Round 3:
- At the World Finals, the top three teams in the Innovation Competition will receive the following cash prizes. (Associates will not be awarded any portion of the monetary prize winnings.)
• First Place: $50,000 USD, to be divided equally among each officially registered member of the Team
• Second Place: $10,000 USD, to be divided equally among each officially registered member of the Team
• Third Place: $5,000 USD, to be divided equally among each officially registered member of the Team
CONTENT AND TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS
All Innovation Projects must be developed using at least one product in the Visual Studio family and must be built to require any one or more of the following platforms:
• Windows
• Windows Phone
• Windows Azure
In addition to one or more of the above, you may also use other Microsoft platforms such as Kinect for Windows SDK, .NET Framework, XNA, Bing maps API, etc., as well as third-party game engines, libraries, and middleware provided you obey their licenses, but none of these are required. As long as your project requires Windows, Windows Phone, or Windows Azure to operate your project meets this requirement.
Games Path ($3,000 prize)
If it’s a game, it belongs on the Games Path. If you’re hoping to entertain your users, give them a fun interactive experience, or even challenge their assumptions about what a game could be, the Games Path is your home.
- Step One: Pitch Video Challenge
- Step Two: Project Blueprint Challenge
- Step Three: User Experience Challenge
- Step Four: Games Competition
Innovation Path ($3,000 prize)
The Innovation Path is the place for the next big thing. Are you looking to change the way people use technology? Are you planning something that will disrupt the current paradigm? Do you see your app in everyone’s hands, all over the world? If that sounds like you, you’re in the right place.
- Step One: Pitch Video Challenge
- Step Two: Project Blueprint Challenge
- Step Three: User Experience Challenge
- Step Four: Innovation Competition
World Citizenship:
Do you want to make the world a better place? The World Citizenship Path is for projects that want to address an important social problem such as disease, natural disasters, civil rights, poverty, access to vital information, gender equality, and so on. It’s about solving real problems for real people.
- Step One: Pitch Video Challenge
- Step Two: Project Blueprint Challenge
- Step Three: User Experience Challenge
- Step Four: World Citizenship Competition
Imagine Cup 2015: Time Line
This Competition starts at 00:01 Greenwich Mean Time (“GMT”) on 10 September 2014 and ends in July 2015 (“Entry Period”) and will consist of three separate rounds as follows: ROUND
Round 1 – National Finals : 10 September 2014 – 23 April 2015
Round 1 – Online Finals : 1 December 2014 – 15 March 2015
Round 2 – World Semifinals : 1 May 2015 – 31 May 2015
Round 3 – World Finals July 2015 – July 2015
For More Information:
Visit the Official Webpage of the 2015 Imagine Cup
