Microsoft’s Imagine Cup Day 2: Winners and Finalists

Buffer

It’s day 2 of the Microsoft Imagine Cup, a global competition that empowers young computer science students to team up and use their creativity, passion and knowledge of technology and quantitative skills to create applications that improve the world in which we live. They just announced the recipients of the three Imagine Cup Awards and the three finalists for the Imagine Cup Championship (Here is a day 1 summary). All 49 finalists of the 2018 Imagine Cup competition were exceptional. Unfortunately, only a handful could win and continue on in the competition.

Imagine Cup Awards

Three winers received the Imagine Cup Award in one of three categories. Each of the teams will receive $15,000. The three categories and the respective winner are:

1. Artificial Intelligence: SochWare – Excessive use of chemicals not only destroys crops, but also negatively impact the ecosystem. Team SochWare has designed a solution “E-Agrovet” to help farmers identify plant diseases, suggest mitigation strategies, connect with experts and get updated with recent agriculture findings and climatic conditions. Additionally, the team’s solution will also enable the farmers to alert nearby harvesters about the situation.
2. Big Data: Drugsafe – DrugSafe was ideated with the unique selling point of being able to provide people with multi-layered checks to validate genuine drugs coupled with some of the most novel technologies like machine learning, artificial intelligence and Blockchain. The robust design of this checking provides a holistic drug validation system.
3. Mixed Reality: Pengram -Pengram is an AR/VR platform which allows engineers from around the world to be holographically ‘teleported’ into a workspace when needed. For example, if an operator that is repairing a $100,000 medical device needs help, they will be able to wire into Pengram, and using a Microsoft Hololens, be able to watch an expert on that device perform the repairs in 3D.

Imagine Cup Championship Finalists

The three finalists for the Imagine Cup Championship were announced today. Each is competing for a $100,000 prize and a mentoring session with Microsoft CEO, Satya Nadella. Be sure to watch the winner being introduced live tomorrow, July 25th, at 9:00 am PT!

1. 

   Mediated Ear

   Mediated Ear: According to the WHO, around 466 million people worldwide suffer from hearing disabilities, of which 34 million are children. A common misconception is that all people with hearing impairments hardly hear anything, but many actually hear a confusing cacophony of noise, making it difficult to focus on specific sounds or voices. This can make everyday outings to noisy environments such as restaurants or cafes exceedingly difficult. Mediated Ear provides an elegant solution to this challenge. Using deep learning, Mediated Ear can isolate any voice from a mixed audio source containing various noises and sounds, including multiple speakers. With Mediated Ear, anyone with a hearing impairment can easily tune into the voice they want to hear, and filter out distracting ambient noise.

2. 

   iCry2Talk

   iCry2Talk: iCry2Talk proposes a low-cost and non-invasive intelligent interface between the infant and the parent that translates in real time the baby’s cry and associates it with a specific physiological and psychological state, depicting the result in a text, image and voice message. The hypothesis adopted by iCry2Talk is that the efficient combination and analysis of different sources of information through advanced signal processing techniques and deep learning algorithms can provide meaningful and reliable feedback to the parent related to the care of his baby.

3. 

   smartARM

   smartARM: smartARM is a robotic hand prosthetic, created using Microsoft Azure Computer Vision, Machine Learning and Cloud Storage. The robotic hand uses a camera embedded in its palm to recognize objects and calculate the most appropriate grip for an object. Using machine learning, the more the model is used the more accurate it becomes.

You can watch the excitement below as Charlotte Yarkoni and Kate Yeager announce the three finalists for the Imagine Cup Championship. Be sure to watch live tomorrow, July 25th at 9:00 am PT, when the winner will be announced!