Developers form all over Asia Pacific gathered here in Bangkok, Thailand to showcase their apps and compete for the prestigious BlackBerry JamHack Asia 2012 award. It was a close fight, but in the end, Team Inspira of Indonesia pulled through to take home the title followed by Australia and Vietnam in the first and second runner up place respectively.
Team Selection
Last month, RIM held a simultaneous JamHack event which took place in several cities across Asia Pacific including Philippines. The winners of the local hackathon get to represent their respective countries and vie for the top spot in the BlackBerry JamHack Asia 2012.
Competition
There were a total of 10 teams who competed for the title, 1 from China, Thailand, Indonesia, Australia, Singapore, Vietnam, Malaysia, and Philippines and 2 teams from India. Each team was given 6 minutes to tell the crowd about their app; how it works, who their target market is and how they plan to earn money from it. After that they are asked by the panel of judges about some other things that the team was not able to discuss during their presentation.
Judging Criteria
Choosing the winner are based on four criteria; Originality of Concept (30%), Technical Quality (30%), Marketability of application (25%) and Overall Demo (15%).
• Originality of Concept – Size of the problem put forth by the team, product design (user experience and user interface), creativity of the solution.
• Technical Quality – Technical optimization of the application on the BlackBerry 10 platform, usage of available APIs, extension beyond application.
• Marketability of application – Relevance to App vibes, RIM local/regional App Strategy, revenue/business model, etc.
• Overall demo – Clarity of presentation, creativity of presentation, ability to answer questions effectively, overall impressions.
The Prize
The winning group will walk away with these prizes:
1. USD10,000 cash prize.
2. All-expense paid trip to the BlackBerry 10 global launch event
3. BlackBerry World marketing for two months following the BB10 launch.
4. Dedicated technical and Business consultancy for up to three months following the BB10 launch in Indonesia.
The Winners
Team Inspira from Indonesia, spearheaded by Vincentius Putra, won the title with their app called Soccer Ticker which is basically an interactive soccer match tracker application. The app lets users to schedule the match they want and interact with other users who are tracking the same match. It also gives a real time update of the game at hand such as Yellow card, penalties and substitution.
Taking the 1st runner up place is the team from Australia with their ride-sharing app called Hive. What the app does is that it helps large companies optimize corporate travel costs by cutting the number of duplicate taxi journeys to one destination.
Team Vietnam grabs the 2nd runner up spot with their achievement/goal logging app called LifeBox 365. It’s simple and straightforward timeline/diary app that enables users to log their progress as they’re working their way towards their personal goal.
The Philippine Team
In spite of the outstanding graphics and engaging gameplay, Team Philippines’ Battleship-inspired game app called Realm of Ellysium didn’t wow the judges enough to win them the title. And while there’s no denying that the team was disappointed with the loss, the team is looking to learn from their shortcomings and further improve their craft in preparation for the next JamHack.
Summary
The BlackBerry JamHack Asia 2012 is the culmination of all the hard work that these developers have put in to make quality app. Win or lose, the fact that they’ve made this far is an achievement on its own. We would like to congratulate the winners of this year’s event and we’re looking forward to the next JamHack event. Hopefully by that time, the Philippine Team will be the named the victor.
