The final of the Imagine Cup 2013 has begun

The final of the Imagine Cup international student project competition has started today in St. Petersburg. Russia is represented by three teams.

Imagine Cup is the brainchild of Microsoft, a competition that the corporation has been holding for students for 10 years in a row. According to the official position of the company, it allows “to identify and develop the abilities of young people in the field of information technology.” In practice, it seems to us, it is rather aimed at finding talented guys who can then be “snapped up”. 

Be that as it may, for the participants of the Imagine Cup, the competition is an opportunity to light up, so as not to suffer with finding a job (although, problems with employment today, to a greater extent, concern the humanities, who have been ordered to the Imagine Cup), as well as a good chance to earn $ 50 thousand for the first place.

The money is not small, but the competition is serious. Only 150 teams from 100 countries of the world take part in the final. But it still had to be hit. According to Microsoft, the number of applications for participation in the Imagine Cup in Russia amounted to more than 3,000. Only three of them reached the final. One of them – from the Moscow Aviation Institute – presented a mobile game to the jury.

Russian finalistsThe final will end on July 12. 

We, in turn, are very interested in the following question: how realistic is such a way of finding talented developers for local teams? And in general, how much is the market interested in “green” newcomers today?  

P.S.

This Thursday, July 11, you will be able to see the participants of the Imagine Cup and their projects in person at the Park Inn Pribaltiyskaya. The organizers also promise an exhibition of their Windows devices and a couple of lectures, one of them on the latest features of Windows 8.1.