After being crowned as one of the top three South African finalists in the local leg of Microsoft’s 2014 Imagine Cup earlier this year, Team Super Sea Dragons has again made the country proud by winning at the global online semi-finals of the Imagine Cup.
Super Sea Dragons from the University of Pretoria scooped the Skype Award and was awarded a $5 000 cash prize. This award is only handed out to three international teams that compete in the competition; considering there were 171 teams from 76 countries competing for top honours, this was no mean feat.
The awards will go a long way in assisting the team to get its project Orbit onto the Windows Phone Store and help to promote it. Orbit is a 2D action-adventure planet platformer, wherein gameplay is focused on the exploration and navigation of small planets, collecting weapons and upgrading these to fight for one’s survival. Players assume the role of Atlas the astronaut, Earth’s last hope for finding a new habitat to survive in.
Team Super Sea Dragons comprises Daniel Esterhuizen, Gerhard Janse van Rensberg, Eleanor Harding and Emile Hay, who are all enrolled at the Department of Information Science at the University of Pretoria.
“Year after year the Imagine Cup has proven that our students have unimaginable creativity. We encourage these young people to consider a career as a software developer. If we are able to channel these ideas, we can do a lot to help South African youth with potential realise a career in coding to export intellectual property or become entrepreneurs in their own right,” says Clifford de Wit, developer and platform lead at Microsoft SA.
“Last year’s local winners – Team SentiMeter – have gone on to form their own profitable and sustainable company, and now Super Sea Dragons have a chance of doing the same.”
From the 171 entrants who competed in the semi-finals, 33 have progressed and will be battling it out for top honours at the worldwide Imagine Cup finals in Seattle later this year.
“In the coming weeks we will be inviting all local participating teams that would like to further their current Imagine Cup solutions to the CSIR for an opportunity to receive mentorship and possible funding,” says De Wit.
