Celcom Axiata Berhad is partnering with Nokia (M) Sdn Bhd and Multimedia Development Corporation (MDeC) to offer app developers around Malaysia the chance to commercialise their creativity through the Nokia S40 Challenge.
[Over the weekend, Celcom hosted a one-and-a-half day free application development workshop in Suntech @ Penang Cybercity]
The challenge, which was launched virtually on 21 December 2012, calls on Malaysian app developers to develop and submit apps for the Series 40 mobile platform owned by Nokia – while standing a chance to win prizes worth more than RM30,000.
There are over 400,000 app downloads per month through Nokia Asha devices in Malaysia running on Series 40 and Nokia expects to see more downloads from consumers spurred by highly-localised apps, the company said in a statement.
As part of the partnership, Nokia will provide training for app development on the Series 40 platform and sponsor cash prizes and mobile phones as prizes. MDeC is the official endorser of the challenge and will promote the initiative to their pool of developers under its Integrated Content Development Programme (ICON).
Participants stand to win a grand prize of RM10,000 in cash, with RM5,000 and RM3,000 for the first and second runner-ups respectively. An additional 25 Nokia Asha mobile devices are up for grabs by early-bird registrations, workshop challenge winners, and developers who put in multiple submissions.
Over the weekend, Celcom hosted a one-and-a-half day free application development workshop in Suntech @ Penang Cybercity on 12 & 13 January 2013, and the next one is due to take place in Menara Celcom, KL on 16 & 17 January 2013. Participants have until 28 February 2013 to submit their entries and winners will be announced in April 2013 via email and the LEDC Facebook page. More details on the challenge can be found here.
Commenting on the initiative, Afizulazha Abdullah, Chief Digital Services Officer of Celcom Axiata Berhad, said, “Within the past couple of years, competition has grown fiercer with mobile app developers trying to conquer popular smartphone platforms with new apps springing up every day. However, there is plenty of untapped revenue opportunities in the Nokia Series 40 platform with over 1.65 million users on Celcom’s network alone, representing 17% of our mobile phone subscribers.”
“Compared to the other popular platforms, there exists only a small fraction of new apps available for Nokia Series 40 phone users. We see our Nokia S40 Challenge as the golden opportunity for local app developers to showcase their talent and commercialise their ideas with our support as well as the backing of our esteemed partners Nokia and MDeC,” added Afizulazha.
This initiative comes under Celcom’s League of Extraordinary Developers Challenge (LEDC) programme which was launched in 2008 and has since organised various content application challenges and conducted workshops for platforms including Android, Blackberry, and Symbian. LEDC also works with local tertiary institutions for the LEDC Ambassador Programme to cultivate a new generation of app developers.
