Meet the Student Startups and Non-profits who won the First Microsoft Imagine Cup Grants

At the World Economic Forum Annual in Davos, Switzerland, Microsoft announced the winners of the inaugural year of the Imagine Cup Grants programme. It is a three-year, $3 million grant programme for student technology and social entrepreneurs.

Imagine Cup Grants Award Winners are:

• Team Apptenders from Croatia. KiDnect is a Kinect-based solution for on-premise and remote physical therapy for children. This software has the ability to monitor a child’s exercises to ensure they are being completed correctly, and then it provides statistical analysis to the therapist.
•  Team Falcon Dev from Ecuador.SkillBox is an affordable solution to help children who are hearing impaired by translating audio received from a teacher in a classroom into sign language. A wireless headset captures the sound and sends it to the computer, and then SkillBox shows the corresponding sign for the word or phrase.
• Team OaSys from Jordan. Horizon is a software and hardware system that allows people who do not have use of their hands or arms to use a computer. Specifically, it tracks head movements and translates these movements into mouse movements. Users are able to have full control of a computer and cellphone, browse the Internet, type, and connect with ease at a low cost.
• Team Lifelens from United States. Lifelens is an innovative point-of-care tool to diagnose malaria using an augmented Windows Phone application. The project addresses the unacceptably high child-mortality rates caused by the lack of detection and availability of treatment of malarial diseases.

The grant packages include $75,000 (U.S.) for each team, as well as software, cloud computing services, solution provider support, premium Microsoft BizSpark account benefits and access to local resources such as the Microsoft Innovation Centers. Microsoft will also connect grant recipients with its network of investors, nongovernmental organization partners and business partners.