OREANDA-NEWS. August 24, 2012. The students and alumni of the SKOLKOVO business school received grants in amount of € 80 000 for the development of the mobile applications intended for social issues solving.

Nokia Corporation announced the results of the contest launched in April 2012 for the students and alumni of the Moscow School of Management SKOLKOVO. The contestants were asked to create mobile applications for smartphones on Windows Phone and Symbian operational systems. The key contest rule was to create an application which could make a positive impact on social environment and ensure the most effective use of the granted funds. The period of realization of each project was limited to a year.

20 project applications have been submitted to the contest by the beginning of June. Representatives of Nokia Corporation and the SKOLKOVO business school, members of the business community and public authorities, analysts and experts have been invited to assess the ideas. Finally, upon the end of project presentations, a meeting of the jury, and a decisive discussion among the experts, the winners have been selected.

They are the Social button project (mobile health care application which optimizes social services and reduces patronage costs) and the Bardakovka project which provides users with an opportunity to react on problems occurring with public utilities and other services and helps citizens to solve these issues. The contest winners received grants totaling € 80 000.

The jury appreciated the projects submitted to the contest - a very high level of their preparation and an innovative approach to social issues in Russian society.

“The Contestants have presented interesting projects, which are of an enormous potential,” says Alexandra Mikhailichenko, head of the SKOLKOVO Business Incubator. “It is a great pleasure for us to hold such contest together with Nokia Corporation, which once again proves its active social position in Russia.”

Erik Bertman, CEO of Nokia Russia, expressed his confidence that the projects, which eventually received grants, would be highly successful, “Nokia was always famous for innovations. That is why we decided to support the contest. The winners have been selected after a long, extensive and hard discussion. We believe that these two projects, the Social button and the Bardakovka, deserve to be granted. They will contribute to the development of the society by solving important issues. Nokia would like to continue supporting innovative projects as Russia is one of our key markets.”