India's Team Caeli Wins 2019 Microsoft Imagine Cup Asia Regional Finals

Microsoft announced Team Caeli from India as the winner of Imagine Cup Asia Finals, after a high-strung finale against 11 other teams from across the region.

Team Caeli won over the hearts of the judges with their smart automated Anti-Pollution and Drug delivery mask specifically designed for patients that are suffering from asthma and other chronic respiratory conditions. Caeli implements breakthrough features that will improve the quality of life for respiratory patients living in polluted areas.

The first runner-up and second runner-up places were awarded to Team RailinNova from China and Team AidUSC from the Philippines, respectively.

Team RailinNova developed the Rail Component Inspection Robot, which determines and identifies rail defects through multi-sensor monitoring. The solution strives to help railway companies to solve any issues more efficiently, and more economically.

Team AidUSC came up with Aqua Check, a water contamination mobile application that enables detection of contamination by taking a photo of a water sample through a microscope.

Team Caeli received USD15,000 and will continue their journey at the Imagine Cup World Championship, which will be held in Seattle in May. First place team at the World Championship will win USD100,000, USD50,000 Azure grant, and a mentoring session with Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella.

Team Caeli’s Aakash Bhadana said: “We are so grateful to have the opportunity to participate in the Imagine Cup, and we are thrilled to represent Asia at the World Finals. We will continue to modify and improve our project, based on the judges’ feedback, before the competition in Seattle.”

This year, 12 finalist teams from 10 countries competed in the Asia Finals. The countries included China, India, Indonesia, Korea, Malaysia, New Zealand, Philippines, Singapore, Sri Lanka and Thailand. These teams were selected from various rounds of the competition online or through in-person National Final events organized by Microsoft subsidiaries in countries across the globe.

This year’s judging panel included senior executives from Microsoft, as well as industry leaders. They evaluated the teams on innovation, and whether each solution presented was comprehensive and marketable. The judges were:

• Rachel Bondi, Marketing & Operations Director, Microsoft Australia
• Kate Carruthers, Chief Data Officer at University of New South Wales, author and founder of IoT MAus
• Justin Garrett, Director in Academic Ecosystems at Microsoft
• Mark Pesce, Author, Inventor & Futurist
• Emily Rich, Managing Director for Australia/New Zealand, Microsoft for Startups

Held annually since 2003, the Microsoft Imagine Cup is the world’s premier student technology competition, affectionately known by participants as the “Olympics of student technology competitions”. This year’s Imagine Cup encouraged participants to “Dream it. Build it. Live it” in order to create applications that shape how individuals live, work and play and through their creativity, passion and knowledge of technology.

For more information about Imagine Cup, please visit https://www.imaginecup.com/.