‘AppZone Champions 2012’ honours application developers

The ‘AppZone Champions 2012’ Award Ceremony saw mobile application developers honoured for excellence in seven different categories.

The competition, now in its second year, looks to recognise developers who have been successful in the development of applications on the AppZone, Sri Lanka’s first third party application development platform.

This year’s event donned the theme of ‘entrepreneurship’ to emphasise the importance of an entrepreneurial spirit in information and communication technology, and for the first time a separate category also honoured Android application developers.

Etisalat CEO, Dumindra Ratnayaka, commented on the AppZone, “The AppZone was something that we developed in conjunction with hSenid in order to empower ambitious Sri Lankan technocrats with a tool that they could use to create mobile applications and a channel through which to market them. At Etisalat we are about innovations that improve your life, and the AppZone not only gave developers an outlet to use their creativity, but the applications themselves improved the value of our offering to our subscribers.”

Commenting on the theme he added: “We want aspiring developers to evolve an entrepreneurial way of thinking, we want them to see needs that are in the market, and design applications that can bring elements together to satisfy that need. The AppZone itself works on a revenue sharing model, and developers earn 70% of the total revenue generated through their applications, allowing them to become entrepreneurs.”

Dinesh Saparamadu, Founder and CEO hSenid Mobile, whose mChoice Cloud TAP powers Etisalat’s AppZone said: “We are delighted with the momentum that has continued since Champions 2011 and the new breed of Mobile applications that have come to the fore and become successful. All credit goes out to these talented developers, who have continued to bring out their creativity on this unique Mobile Application platform as well as fully capitalising the opportunities to become successful Mobile Application Entrepreneurs.”

The competition kicked off last December, and this year was open to all developers not just university students. The categories were Information, Health, Entertainment, Sports, Business and Education, and for the first time a special Android category was also featured. The grand prize winner was awarded a trip to visit Google in Singapore, with the runners up receiving Huawei tablet PCs and smart phones. The winner in the Android category was also awarded a cash prize of Rs. 100,000.

Etisalat also conducted a workshop on digital media on the same day as the award ceremony that was open to all the developers who entered the competition. The workshop looked at the leveraging of digital media as a medium for communication and marketing. The AppZone, which has received many honours in the past including, an mBillionth award, continues to grow now hosting over 380 applications.

As one of the most powerful players in Sri Lanka’s telecommunications industry, Etisalat continues to discover new horizons and explore new possibilities in the domain. Etisalat further offers Sri Lanka’s most cutting edge Internet solutions with the launch if it’s 3.75G technology.

Standing at the top of the ladder in innovation, quality and customer service, they have surpassed four million subscribers in a record time since their launch and Etisalat remains dedicated to increasing its subscriber base and taking the company to greater heights. Etisalat is also the key stakeholder of Sri Lankas first eBook store – www.thebookhub.lk – and Sri Lanka’s first e-learning platform Web Patashala.