They have all been superb!

This is the schedule for the APICTA event in Jakarta. Quite a full and busy schedule especially for the judges who are flown in by the host country. They have to follow a strict code of ethics and work long hours – from 8:30 am – 6:30 pm after which the data is input into the judging system. They then have to check the entry to see that it is accurate and then sign off on it.

This is usually followed by Networking events – this year there was the Hong Kong reception and the Malaysian reception in addition to an RFID sharing session that was set up by Hong Kong.

Adnan Agboatwalla is at APICTA for the 3rd time. Last time PixSense PSP won the Merit in the Communications category (there was no winner). This year the product has undergone a major change with at least a dozen more new features, several new customers like China Mobile, Vodafone Europe and the Philippine telco. He was seen to be fine tuning his presentation, getting his props together and putting everything in the cache in case the wifi service went crazy. He said as he came out that his presentation went perfectly – but Adnan the question is, what did the judges think? When asked, Adnan said they were thrilled with the Geo-tagging feature. He is eyeing the Winners trophy in the Media & Entertainment Category this year. Will he get it?

Zubair and Sharjeel impressed us all with their zeal and their dedication and the support they gave each other. They took advice, worked hard on their presentations and rehearsed them endlessly so as to put on a good show. Zubair is from FAST NUCES Islamabad. He has come up with an application that detects malware that is a non-executable file – could be a pdf, a jpeg, an excel sheet, a word doc or an mp3. Sharjeel is the CEO of SeenReport – a citizen journalism service that has been used by many to upload news and, as he says, “enact change.” His product was pitched in the e-Community and e-Inclusion category which is a new category. They are both “winners” in my book but how did they do in comparison to the other entries in their categories? We will know tonight.

Are Shahzad Shahid of TPS and Khurram of Kraysis comparing notes on strategy or are they giving each other feedback on how their presentations went.

You know whether they get the APICTA trophy or not, both Shahzad and the Kraysis team (Jamil, Khurram and Mustafa) went through the wringer to get their presentations just right. They re-created them and rehearsed them until they were happy that they got them just right. They learnt how one shoe doesn’t fit all – and that they should have different kinds of presentations for different audiences. Good luck guys!

Omar and Faraz Sherwani blew us all away with their delivery styles and the confidence they exuded. They were in Jakarta to pitch products in two categories for brother Jahanzeb who is completing his PhD at Carnegie Melon – Jaadu VNC in the Communications Category and HealthLine in the R&D category. They put on a good show, answered questions with great confidence. Father Khalid Sherwani – a retired banker, a former President of UBL – was with them. They left last night and have requested that I collect the trophy on their behalf if they win. It will be an honour guys! Well done! You have a great future ahead of you. We look forward to seeing more of you.

Have you ever seen anyone as excited as Anjum Farooq Chohan of Palmchip? He said the judges thought that GeoTel was a really amazing R&D project. For those who don’t know what it is, what GeoTel does is, it identifies and pinpoints any breakage in the fibre laid by telcos thus saving downtime and a great deal of lost revenue. This is the first year that we have participated in the R&D category, and we are really excited at the new trend in the Pakistan ICT sector to concentrate on R&D in cutting edge areas. Palmchip has a great product – we will know this evening if it won at APICTA against others in this category. Good luck Anjum.

We took this in the Jakarta Convention Centre yesterday – it was quite impromptu so there are a few people missing from our delegation. Yes that is Jawwad Farid in his shariah-compliant shorts (no he did not wear this for the judging – he actually wore a suit on both days). And next to him is Sultan Hamdani in his Shariah-compliant shalwar kurta. Sultan actually made the immigration officer smile when he responded to a question regarding where he was staying, by saying “my hotel” – the Sultan Hotel is what he meant. 🙂

It is D-Day today and we will have the judges’ verdict at the APICTA dinner tonight. However, as I have said in an earlier post, our team are all winners and we are very proud of their performance at APICTA 2008. I will end with this picture of the Kraysis team that I took as they were walking into the presentation room – chill guys! It is only a competition. 😀