WINNERS OF 7TH REGIONAL APP CHALLENGE ANNOUNCED
Young innovators from Serbia, Montenegro and Bosnia and Herzegovina show their works and compete for valuable awards
At a traditional seventh Regional App Challenge organized by the companies Telekom Srbija, m:tel BiH and m:tel Montenegro – members of Telekom Srbija group, members of 15 teams of high school students presented their creative solutions in the form of applications that facilitate life and have the potential to encourage a positive development of society.
After national competitions where five teams from each country won their participation in the final competition, the applications Vision Assist, by a team from the Electro-Technical High School “Vaso Aligrudić” from Podgorica, ARTour, by a team from the High School Centre “Milutin Milanković” from Milići and the BQuiet application by a team from the Mitrovica High School from Sremska Mitrovica were declared as the most successful. The Vision Assist application received a special creativity award, “Power of Innovation – Igor Osmokrović”.
The winning teams will get the chance to visit a conference in Barcelona dedicated to creativity and visual and digital arts, while the winners of the special awards were granted prestigious mobile handsets.
“During all these years that our program has been running, through the project within the program, generations of young programmers have grown up who are ready to face all the challenges of the present moment. Thus, the participants of this year’s Regional App Challenge, who are currently high school students, already show a great potential and readiness to successfully handle all future challenges. We are very proud of all the students who, despite their school obligations, have diligently worked on creating and designing creative and practical solutions for mobile handsets. The result of their work is reflected in these 15 innovative applications which are presented at the final competition today”, said Vladimir Lučić , the CEO of Telekom Srbija.
During their work on the applications, and with the support of their teachers and employees at Telekom Srbija, m:tel Montenegro and m:tel Bosnia and Herzegovina, the talented students had the chance to apply the knowledge acquired at school, improve their ability for team work and finish the creative process by presenting the applications as a finished product.
The CEO of the m:tel BiH company, Jelena Trivan said that this competition was another proof that all three countries from which the contestants came from had high hopes for young people and encouraged them to stay in these countries and develop their skills. “All our companies have student scholarship programs, so assuming that you will continue your schooling at one of technical faculties, you should know that our scholarships and our support await you there, along with employment in our companies afterwards. All this is proof that this region and Telekom Srbija as a group are committed to providing long-term and thorough support to young people from the beginning of their entrepreneurial initiatives, until the end of their working and life span. We stand with you and congratulate you on all your successes“, said Jelena Trivan.
Dušan Radusinović, the head of the Strategy and Risk Department in m:tel Montenegro congratulated the winners and expressed his satisfaction at the fact that this project traditionally gathered the most talented young people from the region. “The world is changed by people with a vision – the world is changed exactly by you and you will have absolute support from the Telekom Srbija Group. We are proud of you because you have chosen the IT profession, which before all others stepped into the future and we are here to help you develop and create a successful professional career”, said Radusinović.
On behalf of the winning team from Serbia, the student Andrej Filko expressed great satisfaction and pride at winning the award, and creating the application that he believed would bring a positive experience to its users.
“We are happy that we won, but there was a lot of competition from the other contestants and their really great ideas, that's why I think we are all winners, because reaching the regional competition is really a great success. We are planning to develop our application further, since it has potential for improvement, and I would especially like to thank mts for this experience and the entire organization”, said Andrej on behalf of his team.
After three years of being held online, the Regional App Challenge brought together students from the region in Belgrade who, in addition to participating in the competition, had the opportunity to learn about the works and way of thinking of their peers from the region, to socialize and visit the Nikola Tesla Museum. Additional motivation for the students was the lecture by Davor Sakač, the director of the TS Ventures Fund, who explained trends in the startup environment and provided the students with additional information on how to cope with all challenges in the future and make their products competitive in a dynamic market environment.
