Vodacom claims that its AppStar challenge will upgrade to an international contest after the inclusion of Kenya, Tanzania, Qatar, Egypt and Lesotho.
This international shift will enable young developers and their startups to gain a worldwide traction through good publicity in the challenge.
Commenting on the South African challenge, Prins Mhlanga, Managing Executive of Digital Media at Vodacom, said: “In the 2011 Vodacom App Star Challenge, we saw some highly innovative apps come to the fore. This year we’re hoping that innovation will be switched a notch higher and that it will also feature a variety of unique apps that may contribute towards helping South Africa in addressing its socio-economic challenges.”
According to Vodacom, the top two applicants of the various local challenges will submit their projects to a global competition, which will bring finalists of the various challenges head to head.
“In the local challenge, the top three finalists will be rewarded for developing innovative apps. The top two finalists will also get an opportunity to compete against international participants from competing countries,” the company said.
The top three winners in the international challenge will receive US$25,000, US$15,000 and US$10,000 respectively. The fourth and fifth winners will get US$2,000 each.
In Kenya, the AppStar challenge is being held in association with Safaricom Ltd. The company has called the local developers to enter the challenge in a bid to publicise and monetise their apps.
Developers can come up with apps across the famous mobile platforms including Symbian, Android, Java and Blackberry.
The applications for the various challenges are still on. The last date of registration is Oct 26 with App Submissions on Nov 2.
