Imagine Cup 2010 – People’s Choice Award

Posted on by Ooi Keng Siang

Imagine Cup 2010 had put up the video submitted by all competitors that successfully get into the worldwide final round for software design category. All Imagine Cup  projects share the same vision, that is to solve the world toughest problem. Support your most favorite team or project by give your vote to them! Show your support to them before 7th of July 2010 which is the closing date for People’s Choice Award voting.

People’s Choice Award:  http://www.msstudentlounge.com/studentrally/tabid/81/Default.aspx

I’m going to show my support to my own country team while take a look at ideas of other countries team and support them as well if I like it.

by Ooi Keng Siang via Ooiks’s Blog

PolyU Global Student Challenge 2010 – Day 4

Posted on by Ooi Keng Siang

Whole day of full of activities were waiting for us. Our first stop was the Hong Kong Science Park where innovation and creative idea turn into real business here. We were presented how the Sciences Park can help the new startup technology related companies especially those require research and development. We were given the chance to tour around the Science Park and got to know more about research and development carry out by the companies at Science Park. I didn’t found anything particular interest me expect the big egg sharp conference hall where we listen for the presentation.

Next was Dim Sum lunch at Jumbo Kingdom Restaurant. I was really hungry and excited to try out Hong Kong dim sum because many people told me that Hong Kong dim sum is the best. The restaurant is build on top of a giant big ship. In order to get to the restaurant, we need to board on a small boat first before we got on board onto the big Jumbo ship. That was something really special. The jumbo ship was really big and it was not shaky at all. The restaurant environment was great. It is full of Chinese kingdom style of design, the dragon symbol were everywhere. Everyone was queuing up to wait for the chances to sit on the dragon chair and took photo. Most important thing was… the food there was really great! Some of the competitors cannot make it for today activities (Not sure what happened) thus this left a lot of food for us to finish it off and we were really happy to do so because the food were just too delicious (I guess those who miss it must be regard by now). It is something that everyone should go and try out if visiting Hong Kong.

After the delicious lunch, our next activity was visiting Cyberport. It is something similar like Science Park but Cyberport is specially for multimedia, mobile and ICT related company only. The technology showcase here had caught my attention because of my interest in ICT technology. Most of the building here is inter-connected and the environment is so nice. There is a small park just outside of the building where I saw some of the employees were having their coffee and relaxing there with a nice sea view. Cinema and many food choices also available at there. Cool! I guess ICT people really know how to relax, that why I’m in this field.

We were sent back to student hall resident after that, while the top 6 teams for each division will have to do a 60 seconds of elevator pitch after this. Elevator pitch is not going to be easy. The key idea behind elevator pitch is to attract the attention of venture capitalist on your product before they left the elevator and the final goal is to get the second chance to present to them if they interested. I wish all 12 teams all the best for them.

Since we had nothing to do after that, we went to Mong Kok for dinner and side seeing. First impression of Mong Kok was… many many many peoples there. I never saw that many peoples on the street. There are a lot of things to shop there as well. Variety of food, cloth, accessory, gadget and etc ranging from cheap to expansive. We were there until 11 something before we caught the last few train back to the student hall.

Tai Chi tomorrow! I didn’t play tai chi since I graduated from secondary school and I had forgotten all the steps. Next will be Ocean Park, which is the most famous park in Hong Kong. I’m so looking forward for tomorrow activities.

by Ooi Keng Siang via Ooiks’s Blog

PolyU Global Student Challenge 2010 – Day 3

Posted on by Ooi Keng Siang

Finally the day had come, the judgment day. All 28 teams from university division and 29 teams from secondary school division will compete for the top 6 finalist places in each division. Everyone look so confident when heading to PolyU campus from student hall resident for presentation. This is not going to be easy!

Very unlucky that we got the very last slot for the presentation, thus we had to wait nervously until our turn came. But it was also lucky for us to got the chances to watch other competitors to present and got to know how tough the question throw by the judges. Man, the judges really gave all competitors a hard time. All the questions were very straight forward and strike on each business plan weakness. One of the judges in our room (all teams were divided into 6 group and compete in the same room) was an ex-economic ministry (something like that, I forget the full title), this make us even more nervous.

I can said all competitors were really good! They have great idea, great business plan and great presentation. We got the chances to watch one team from US to present in our room who actually got into the top 6. They got their product protected by applying IP, getting approver from some institution and many promising facts. They were fully prepared for everything. They done everything single thing that one who running the company will really do. I’m really impress with their passion toward their solution. I guess I still need a lot more passion if I really want to step into becoming an entrepreneur. I heard this team had gone into many competitions using this same product before and win too.

Finally our turn to present. We did our best to present our solution. Yes, finally we can use our tablet PC to present our solution although we present it without the projector. Well, at least we got the chances to demo it. Like other teams presented, the judges also gave us a hard time during question and answer section. One of the judges was confuse between software and hardware, like he had no idea what was the different between software application that consumer can purchase and install on their tablet. We had a hard time explaining that. Gosh, but he know about iPad and Windows.

After the presentation was the result announcement. As we had expected, we did not make it into the top 6. Our group’s competitors were very strong and competitive. We lose, but this does not stop us from continue having fun in Hong Kong. We are still looking forward for all the fun activities on the following days. I can’t remember the list of top 6 teams name in both division, I guess I will just skip it here.

We went for our dinner after that and have fun chatting non-stop among our team members because we finally reunion here in Hong Kong and have the time for chatting (no need to prepare for presentation any more). Time to sleep, adventure is waiting for me tomorrow.

by Ooi Keng Siang via Ooiks’s Blog

PolyU Global Student Challenge 2010 – Day 2

Posted on by Ooi Keng Siang

The second day at Hong Kong. Me and my team wake up with the sleepy face as we did not get much sleep last night because of busy preparing the presentation. Whole day long of training is waiting for us, we took a short walk from student hall resident to PolyU campus. Not really far actually, but it was very convenience as we didn’t require to cross a single road. The path to the campus are on the sky bride. Cool man and the campus is huge!

We had short briefing about the competition before we went for the campus tour. On the briefing, we only figure out that we were only provided with one and only one projector which is connected with the PC with the power point presentation only. Gosh, how are we suppose to show our software solution which is in our tablet PC? Then we try to request for switching between the PC and our tablet PC, but we got rejected and told that it is not fair if we bringing another PC for the competition. I was kind of wordless that time and think, how suppose that an additional PC will bring in unfair advantages for other competitors? Well, I guess previously no other teams bring in any software product for competition, but only hardware products. I guess we need to come out with plan B without any demo because we might not be able to bring in the tablet PC at all. This is definitely a disadvantage for our team and part of our preparation last night gone for nothing!

We tour around the campus lead by Jackie. She show us a lot of interesting places in the campus. Computer room, innovation center, sport area, canteen, and the list continue. All building name is name with a person’s name. Hmm, it must be hard to remember all the building name, that why all building is given an alphabet. After the tour, I can said PolyU is a really nice place and environment for study. We even had our lunch at the canteen in the campus. I love their canteen food, clean and delicious! Yammy!

Today training was about presentation. A last minute presentation skill polishing for all competitors. John Miers was our speaker today. He gave a good talk about presentation but I was too tired and start fishing at the end of the talk. John said that business presentation is similar like general public speaking, which I can’t really agree with it. We will given only 20 minutes time to present our solution and we can’t really take a slow pace word by word with pause because we will definitely run out of time that way. Pause in between the word may sound ok for general public speaking but I guess is not so ok for business presentation as the audience might think that you came on stage without a full preparation. Well, I did agree with some of the point he mention, such as relaxing, present like you talk with your friend, and 25 second rule for answering question.

After the whole day talk, we were going to have our dinner at Star Ferry Cruise! It sound so exited for us. This was the first time I broad on a cruise (on sea, last time I did on a river), and it was very shaky! Lucky I was able to hold on with the seasick. The view of the cruise was really nice. I can see the Hong Kong city lighting up at night. No wonder people keep on saying that Hong Kong night view is the best, now I know why.

Finally the dinner is over, time to go back to student hall resident and do our final preparation for presentation because tomorrow will be our judgment day. Gosh, we need to overcome our sleepiness and come out with a new plan without the live demo of our solution. It is going to be a sleepless night again.

by Ooi Keng Siang via Ooiks’s Blog

PolyU Global Student Challenge 2010 – Day 1

Posted on by Ooi Keng Siang

PolyU Global Student Challenge 2010, the day had finally come. Me and my team members were so excited to visit Hong Kong for this competition since last year because the competition had delay 1 year due to AH1N1 blast off last year. Today, we finally step on the land of Hong Kong. Yes, this is the first time we visit Hong Kong and today is my birthday as well!

Once we step into the departure hall at the airport, student ambassadors and the video capturing team are long awaited for us. Before we ever get the time to shake of our sleepiness, video interview was waiting for us already. After some quick video interviewing, we are ready to go. We meet our student ambassador, Jackie and she is going to take care of us for the following whole week. Nice to have her there.

After reaching at PolyU student hall, we do a quick registration and went to our room. First impression of PolyU student hall or hostel to me is the security is very strict!  Security guard and check point are everywhere. Going in and out require us to scan our badge. Gosh, I guess we are really safe in the building. While waiting for the Welcome Drink, Jackie bring us around the student hall and introduce us the facility in the student hall. Wawee, they have karaoke room, swimming pool,  gym room, snooker room, gaming room and etc. Gosh, that is so much different with our Malaysia university hostel facility.

During Welcome Drink event we meet some competitors around the world. Cool man, but there are 28 teams competing, this is going to be tough. After that we went out for dinner ourselves. Exploring around and went into one of the local restaurant to try some local food. Yeah, they are great! Our ever first meal at Hong Kong. Yummy… maybe we are just too hungry…

Time to go back and start preparing our presentation…

by Ooi Keng Siang via Ooiks’s Blog

Imagine Cup 2010 Malaysia – Opinion and Comment

Posted on by Ooi Keng Siang

In this post, I want to share my opinion and comment on Imagine Cup 2010 Malaysia on both the event and the competitors. I make no offense to anyone. If you think the way I’m writing is not suitable, do tell me so that I can be aware of it.

Opinion and comment on Imagine Cup event:

  • Close presentation equal to close the learning door. I personally dislike close presentation especially those semi-final and finalist presentation. Since they had been selected as the best of the best, it is time for others to learn from them, how they present, how they sell their solution and etc. Close presentation stop the learning process from each others which is suppose to be the spirit of Imagine Cup. I truly hope this limitation can be remove in next Imagine Cup.
  • Time and space limitation. I personally feel that round one is a lot tougher than round two because everyone is given 10 minute to present which include Q&A and further more the place is a public showcase where there are possibility get interrupted. Besides, it is not easy for all 5 judges to stare on a small laptop screen unless competitor did bring a projector or big LCD screen. I can said round one did kill a lot of competitor’s dream.

Opinion and comment on  competitors:

  • Make it short and simple during the showcase. Try to give a simple explanation and demo when visitor visit your booth and not a full length presentation. Some competitors give me a 20 minutes presentation with power point slide when I visited their booth which is too much (but I appropriate it). Imagine there are so many visitor there and each of them you given them 20 minutes of presentation… Make a short and simple explanation for the visitor to let them know your solution main concept will be enough. If they want more, they will ask.
  • Lack of public presentation skill. I can see some competitors start to get panic to present in front of a cloud of people. They even forget their script or strategies they had planned. Stay clam, take a deep breath. Practice make perfect, don’t remember your script last minute.
  • Targeting the wrong goal. I did mention this in my last post about presentation and slide that by targeting the wrong goal, you are targeting to fall. Take a close look on the goal’s detail, for example the education. The main primary problem is many children can’t even complete their primary school education due to lack of money. How they can effort to own a PC by then? If your solution cannot answer this question, that’s mean your solution are not solving this problem or targeting this goal correctly. Reviews the goal detail and add required feature so that your solution can fit into the goal you targeting more correctly.
  • Don’t be greedy by targeting all 8 goals. I did see some solution trying to target 8 goals all at once using their one single solution, but I’m going to said that this is not going to work. There doesn’t exist a silver bullet that can kill every monster, this apply to software solution as well. As judge’s point of view, they are seeking a solution that can solve a single problem completely or as much as possible compare with solve each problem a little bit.
  • Interface design is very important. Some might argue having a great idea is better than having a great GUI design, but would you rather use a software which have a poor GUI design which you can’t even know where is the feature you looking for than having a great GUI design which you can find what you need with no help? You have the answer in yourself. That is the reason why we have Human Computer Interaction major in computer study field. Don’t forget that there are 10% point allocated for usability.
  • Where is your research? Some competitors did not do their homework. Where are the number of target users? Mobile penetration rate? Internet penetration rate? Usability study? Research is the only way to convince the judges how practical your solution is. Don’t assume what user think of, this is not your school assignment or project, the judges need a value / a number that they can trust on. A picture with a few people looking at the laptop is not enough.
  • This is your competition not your mentor’s competition. I can see some mentor is eager to help their student from presentation, booth declaration, question and answer,  even helping editing the slide. This is too much. This is suppose to be your competition and not your mentor’s competition, what your mentor provide is advise, you can choose to listen or not to. Don’t let the advice become command.
  • Don’t talk like a loser! Imagine cup’s slogan: “You win, we all win”. You might have opinion or comment on other’s winning solution, but don’t let it be the wall that block your learning way. Competitors should learn from each other and not firing on each other after the event end. Yes, I understand that the feeling of losing doesn’t taste good especially if you think your solution is better than others yet lose to them. But try to ask yourself what went wrong instead of pointing your finger on others. That is the way of learning. “If you win you need not to explain… But if you lose you should not be there to explain.” – by Adolph Hitler.

I guess thats for all now. Will add more if I remember. Phew. This is a long list too.

by Ooi Keng Siang

Imagine Cup 2010 Malaysia Result

Posted on by Ooi Keng Siang

Imagine Cup 2010 Malaysia had come to an end. Team HDC from APIIT will be presenting Malaysia in the worldwide final at Poland. This year, APIIT had hug away the most prizes and I can see team from UMP is doing a great job this year. As usual USM is still one of the big players in Imagine Cup Malaysia. It is very interesting to see more and more students and universities are stepping up for challenge compare with last year.

Champion: Team HDC (APIIT) – Project Apple

First-runner Up: Celestial (USM) – Map Integrated Disaster Sharing Portal (MiDS)

Second-runner Up: MediaLab Studio (UMP) – ECO-Bumi

The Best Presentation Award: Team HDC (APIIT) – Project Apple

The Coolest Application Award: Celestial (USM) – Map Integrated Disaster Sharing Portal (MiDS)

Multi-point Award: Cyber Knight (APIIT) – Global Knowledge Reactor

The Most Promising Award: Cyber MarksMan (UPNM) – Search And Rescue Tactical Management System  (SARTaMS)

Consolation prizes:

Beginner (UTarc) – Green Reconnect

Cyber MarksMan (UPNM) – Search And Rescue Tactical Management System  (SARTaMS)

Hello World (UPM) – SAFER

Marshmellow (USM) – Traveler Health Awareness Tracker

Too bad I didn’t get the chances to visit Team HDC’s booth during the showcase, thus missing the chances to watch their full live demo of their system. From the stage presentation, I can see Project Apple created by Team HDC is targeting to improve health and wellbeing by promoting good eating habits as they found out those bad eating habits is the main cause of most diseases. I like the clean interface they design, smooth and confident presentation. The coolest part is, they even integrated bar code scanning through camera to get more detail about nutrition in the fruit.

Celestial created Map Integrated Disaster Sharing Portal (MiDS) to provide a platform to alert public on disasters happening, share information and solve the problem through system community. The application utilized the deep zoom technology in Silverlight Bing Map which makes the application look very cool. The simple and easy to understand interface add another plus point for this team.

MediaLab Studio created Eco-Bumi, a video game that will educate gamers about eco-system preservation. Although is just a merely 2D game, but they use manga style of drawing which make the game look very interesting. The team even show me their backend coding during my visit to the booth, and I’m impressed by them.

I had a few comment on this Imagine Cup event and for the competitor as well, but I’ not too tired to list it out. I guess I will do it next time. Congratulation to all winner again and for those who did not grab away any prizes, don’t give up you had come so far, so please don’t stop at here. 🙂

by Ooi Keng Siang

Imagine Cup 2010 Malaysia – Day 2

Posted on by Ooi Keng Siang

Imagine Cup 2010 Malaysia 2010 day two start today! Every competitor is busy preparing their presentation since the very early morning. I can see some “panda” busy preparing over night with a very little sleep only.

There is a public showcase of each team’s solution to the public and as well as to the judges in the morning. I can see a few very interesting and promising projects. I had been spending the whole morning time to visit as many booths as I can to get to know more about each project, but I only manage to visit 16 booths out of 29 booths. I guess I don’t have that time to blog each and every project out at here now with my battery is running low now.

The top 7 teams that made it to the final round had announced. They are Beginner (Tarc), Celestial (USM), Cyber Marksman (UPNM), Hello World (UPM), Marshmellow (USM), Medialab Studio (UMP) and Team HDC (APIIT). Congratulation to all of them. Now all 7 teams are having their hard time presenting their solution to the judges, but too bad the section is close and private which I couldn’t get to see their live action.

 

There are a grand dinner later on tonight which the top 3 team will presenting on the stage. I guess this is the exciting time to see their presentation and get to know the final result of which team represent Malaysia going to the Poland. Stay tune to my twitter to the latest update.

by Ooi Keng Siang

Imagine Cup 2010 Malaysia – Day 1

Posted on by Ooi Keng Siang

Imagine Cup 2010 Malaysia start today at Pulau Langkawi. All competitors from university around Malaysia has come together at Awana Proto Malai, Pulau Langkawi to participate in Imagine Cup 2010 Malaysia. Total of 29 teams from both public and private university in Malaysia had join this grand IT competition.

Beside the main competition (Software Design) which will be carry out tomorrow,  Microsoft also announced another 2 side competition during the competitors briefing. They are photo shooting with photo sync and video capturing. Both competition are sharing the same title, “The Best Moment in Pulau Langkawi”. There are RM300 to be given away for this 2 competitions! Too bad, I guess I’m not allowed to participated.

While everyone was busy preparing their booth for tomorrow judgment day,  I’m here to blog the latest update of this event. Too bad I have limited Internet connectivity, thus may not update my blog as frequency as I want, but I going to catch all the information and all the news and share with everyone once I had the chance. Meanwhile, stay tune in my twitter!

I’m so hungry after all the journey from Bella Vista Hotel to the event hall, but I’m looking forward to tonight BBQ dinner with all competitions. Lets make some friend and shoot some photo!

by Ooi Keng Siang

Imagine Cup 2010 Malaysia – Presentation Tips and Tricks

Posted on by Ooi Keng Siang

Congratulation again to all team that successfully enter the final round and preparing to go for Pulau Langkawi. I bet everyone must be very excited now.

Today I want to share my personal experience (team experience too) on imagine cup presentation (for software design category). This is my personal point of view and it is NOT related with any Malaysia final round guideline or what so ever. I would said, take it as a reference only. Although 10% marks is allocated for presentation, but my advise is presentation make up 70% because a poorly presented solution will never attract people attention.

Overall presentation:

  • Presentation script / storyboard. It is highly recommended to script what to present or write a presentation storyboard. Carefully plan what should be included in the script because presentation time given is limited. Include problem, solution, system demo, research, etc into your script and arrange according to your need. A good presentation start with a good planning. Review the script again and again when practice. If your team member is not good in English, find some one who is good to correct the script to make it perfect.
  • Interactive / Role playing presentation. A lengthy of introduction and solution explanation by each team member one by one then follow by a system demo, such classical presentation will only make the judges fall asleep. Add some creativity in the presentation such as role playing (example one act like student and explain what is the problem while another give the solution). Judges are expecting a smooth and natural presentation like watching a movie yet they are provided with all information about the solution thought the movie. Let’s give the judges some surprises through out the “show” and prevent them from falling asleep.
  • Make it simple. The judges usually came from different professional field with different background. Some of them might no understand the scientific term you using, make it simple so that everyone can understand. For example, if your solution target to solve TB disease, just mention TB will be good enough for everyone to understand, and don’t give scientific name where it is hard to pronounce and hard to understand.
  • Practice make perfect. There is no short-cut to make a perfect presentation. Practice until you remember the script without the paper (Many people tend to direct read from paper if they got the paper in hand, which is very bad). Practice until no more la, lu, lo, ok, a, etc (although no point given for language speaking, but judges will be annoyed and give a bad impression). A smooth presentation is possible only if a lot of practice is done, so go practice the script even you are in the washroom!
  • Backup plan. Always have one or two backup plan in case something go wrong. Prepare a backup machine, video record your software solution (especially for application that required Internet connection), have a local hosted server (if your web is hosting at other places on the Internet), take all installation software needed, bring your own wireless broadband and etc. Murphy’s law – “Anything that can go wrong will go wrong”.
  • Prepare for Q&A. Try brainstorm questions that judges will ask after listen to your presentation. For example like detail break down of cost, competitor analysis and etc. If those information that judges ask for did not cover or not detail enough in the presentation, put all in the appendix slide. Surprise your judges that you are fully prepare to answer any question they might throw to you. Try to do several rounds of presentation to others before final like lecturers, you might collect ton of interesting questions for final presentation Q&A preparation.
  • Deploy the solution. Well, I personally feel very annoying to see competitor present their software solution through the magic click of Debug (F5) button in Visual Studio. It look very unprofessional and sound like software might crash anytime. If the software solution is an desktop application, build that application into executable file and run directly from the executable file when present. If the solution is a web base application / site, deploy it to a server or at least to localhost and direct access to the site when present. Execute using debug button also cause the application run slower, take time to restart (when something go wrong during presentation) and whole world will know when error pop up!
  • Hide all bugs! It is understandable that no software / application is 100% bug free especially application that build it such a short time, but you definably don’t want the bug show up during presentation and spoil the party. Execute the software according to the script at least one to make sure no bug. If got, fix it! Make good use of try catch in C# to kill all the bugs! If something go very wrong during presentation, just close the application and execute it again or refresh the web page (That is the good of deploy your solution), stay clam and don’t panic because judges won’t know what actually happen if you hide it well.
  • Live demo. It is highly recommended to do a live demo of your system during the presentation time unless your solution using a something big that unable bring to the stage, for example a car! Using video recording or screenshot of your system and show it during presentation will not help you gain much point because judges know student are smart enough to mock up those things. Do not give a lame excuse such as hardisk crash and all project gone, you sure will BOMB by judges on the spot!
  • Presentable dress code. Yes, you can wear formal dress with coat, but it doesn’t mean it is a must. Synchronize with other team members to wear the same dress to show your team work to the judges. You can even have your own custom made team T-shirt. If you act as doctor, wearing doctor coat will add you some creativity point too.
  • Be confident. When you presenting, the stage is all yours. Be confident in yourself and your solution. If you can’t even make yourself believe in it, how you gone make other believe in it. Practice make perfect!
  • Don’t distribute booklet for the judges! It is very commonly to see presenter distribute booklet or something for the judges to read before presentation start. This distract the judges concentration on your presentation as some of judges might reading your booklet when you presenting. You always have the chances to disturb booklet or provide more information to them when they visit your booth.

Presentation slide (I only list out those important point that require extra care, those not in the list doesn’t mean it is not needed or not important to put into presentation slide):

  • Define the problem. It is your mission to tell the audience how serious is the problem that your solution is trying to solve. For example, everyone know TB disease kill a lot of people, but how many actually? So do some research on the problem and tell the audience XX,XXX numbers of people killed every year because of this disease. Emotion appealing way of present your problem sure will give you a great boost on your presentation, but try not to spend too much time on this as some of the judges already know how serious of the problem it is and spend long time on presenting the problem make them bored.
  • Solution Impact. This competition is all about how your solution can create the impact that can change the world. The judges not just care about how your solution impact the users, they also can about how many users your solution can impact. Define who is your solution target users and how many of them. Remember to pump in some research data / number in order to claim your point. Is best to target on users in Malaysia first before users at other countries (Solve your own country problem before you can solve other countries problem).
  • Solve the right millennium goal. Know the detail of the millennium goal you trying to solve before you claim it. Many competitors claim that they solve one of the targeted millennium goal but in fact they are not. For example, Goal 2: Universal Education is ensure everyone will be able to complete a full course of primary schooling. If your solution is targeting secondary school student, then you fail to achieve the goal. Try to re-strategies your presentation and solution if you found that you had target the wrong goal. Claiming that your solution can solve all / most goals does not win your any extra points, but you are only making fun of yourself in front of the judges. Concentrate on your target goals. No single solution can solve the whole world’s problems.
  • Project sustainability / Business value. Hot question that will definably ask by the judges. It is highly recommended to show how the project can sustain during the presentation, for example by government funded, collaboration with business partner, by startup and etc. Try to avoid becoming open source as the reason for your project sustainability, because only a few open source projects are able to sustain and most judges knew that. Be sure you have the prove if you said your project is funded by some organization. “Project build to solve the millennium goal, but unable to sustain themselves; it soon will becoming another millennium problem.“, quote from one of the judges during Imagine Cup 2009 Malaysia final.
  • Competitor analysis. Do a simple search whatever there are some similar solution out there or not. If there exist similar solution, do a competitor analysis or you can even compare with old method with your new solution. don’t assume the judges know nothing about other products out there, they knew it. Show why your solution is more better than others, what feature your solution have while others don’t. Most ideas presented are not unique but you can make your solution unique.
  • Research, research and research. A statement without proof are merely just a sentence. It is always better to tell “XX,XXX number of people killed by TB and $X,XXX,XXX had been spend on this each year.” then “Many people killed by TB and many money spend on this each year.”. Judges usually only believe on real number. Please DO NOT create those fact by yourself. If your application interface also did some research according to user feedback, that is also a research, show it!
  • Make it simple and interesting. Dress up your presentation slide with picture and not just words. This is not a lecture time, no body will want your slide to go home revision. Make your slide simple with picture that let people understand easily and you present and explain it in more detail. “Don’t read out from the slide, you think I can’t read it out my own?” quote from one of my friend who is experience in presentation.

Phew, what a long list. Hope the one who read my blog post still stay awake. I guess this are the tips that I can came out from my mind now. Will add more if I think of any.

by Ooi Keng Siang