The international finals of Imagine Cup 2011 begins in New York

For the ninth consecutive year, Microsoft is about to close its Imagine Cup competition. Each issue is divided into several stages. Thus, each participating country makes its own final before winning teams meet in a unique destination that changes every year. For Imagine Cup 2011, several hundred students gathered in New York.

This is the first time in history that the finals of the competition takes place on American soil. Here are a few figures of previous years:

* 2003, Barcelona, ​​Spain: 1000 students from 25 countries, 15 finalists
* 2004, Sao Paulo, Brazil: 10 000 students from 90 countries, 50 finalists
* 2005, Yokohama, Japan: 30 000 students from 97 countries, 86 finalists
* 2006, Delhi, India: 68,000 students from over 100 countries, 76 finalists
* 2007, Seoul, South Korea: more than 100,000 students from 126 countries, 120 finalists
* 2008, Paris, France: more than 200,000 students from 124 countries, 124 finalists
* 2009 Cairo, Egypt: More than 300,000 students from over 140 countries, 143 finalists
* 2010, Warsaw, Poland: more than 325,000 students from over 140 countries, 122 finalists

And this year? More than 350,000 students from 183 countries.

The national finals have selected the best projects which all contribute here in New York to win trophies and prizes that accompany them. Putting the dishes in the large, Microsoft has brought together hundreds of finalists in the Marriott Marquis in Manhattan in the heart of Times Square. The number of students and various people around the contest is as much of the hotel is reserved by Microsoft: 450 students, 100 judges, 86 menor, 140 journalists and staff of the publisher.

We are on hand to cover the event and to present a maximum of competing projects, whether winners or not. We spend so time with teams from around the world, including Algeria, Armenia, Australia, Bangladesh, Bosnia / Herzegovina, Brazil, Chile, China, Costa Rica, Cyprus, Ecuador, Finland, Germany, Greece, Iraq, Japan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Nigeria, Pakistan, Peru, Russia, Sri Lanka, Uganda, United Arab Emirates, Vietnam, and of course ... France and the United States.

We remind you also that five teams participating in the tri international final:

* Geekologics in the category of Game Design Phone Windows 7, with their title Brainergy
Dream'n'Touch * in the Software Design category, with their proposed digital schoolbag eBakPak
* Close World Mobile Game Design in the category of Windows 7 Phone, with their title Hilomi
* Give Me 4 in the Embedded Development category, with their project Link TV
* India Rose, in the category Windows 7 Touch with their project to help autistic children

Teams that we followed during the Boot Camp and then to the French final of Imagine Cup. In the coming hours, a welcoming ceremony will take place before the competition really starts tomorrow, during which Steve Ballmer will be present. The first day will be long and will run from 11 to 21:00. A crucial step in which juries composed of teachers, professionals, and other Microsoft executives will prune fairly brutal. In the showpiece Software Design, the first day will increase the number of teams from 62 to only 18.

During the next few days we shall be issuing a series of articles with dozens of projects. As you can see, the originality and ideas have no use of GDP and ranking of global powers.