By Emeka Aginam

To create more awareness and get more students register for the Imagine Cup 2013 early enough, organizers of the event, the global software giant, Microsoft has disclosed that it would leverage on social media.

The Lead, Developer Platforms, Microsoft Sub Sahara Africa & Indian Ocean Islands, Dele Akinsade who disclosed this to Vanguard Hi-Tech in online interaction said that, “We have started early this year, leveraging social media and other forums to let students register early and prepare for the event. We will also be doing some campus events to get to drive this point home.

Already according to him, the Imagine Cup 2013 season was officially launched on 29 August, along with the announcement that Microsoft has redesigned the competition around three new core competitions including World Citizenship, Games and Innovation and more than doubled the prize money to US$300 000”he explained.

Inspires more students to participate:
According to him, through these changes, Microsoft hopes to inspire more students and encourage a wider variety of aspiring innovators to participate.

“This year is much more different. We are starting the awareness and excitement much earlier. We are having online competitions monthly to reach more students globally.

With these changes, he said with optimism that Microsoft expects a lot more competitors and teams, adding that they were expecting a lot of sponsors and support from our partners in this. The opportunities ahead is bountiful, we just have to make more students aware of this great competition” he added.

This year, according to him, Microsoft had the biggest prizes in the history of the competition. Microsoft, he said has indeed hired a lot of students that have participated in the Imagine Cup competition since its inception going on 10 years plus now. Some of these smart students he added have also been hired by our partners as well.