It was Jehan and Rabia Garib’s twitter feed that led me to register my product for the mBillionth Award 2010. When I registered, I knew that we’ll be rejected in even short listing as we couldn’t find an appropriate category to nominate our product. Moreover our application was unlaunched and running in private alpha amongst our own company employees. We thought that by the time jury will judge our entry, we will launch the public alpha. But if you are in a telecom business where operators have an upper hand, launching your service independently becomes a herculean task. I don’t know which place did we end up in Grand Jury held in Colombo last month but I am happy that we were at least shortlisted for jury.

The m-Billionth Award South Asia 2010 was the first of its kind in the region recognizing and felicitating mobile innovations, applications and content services delivery. It was arranged to honour excellence in mobile communications across South Asia spread over 10 core categories. The m-Billionth Award is designed as an annual South Asia’s leading mobile content’s award platform towards larger regional Mobile Congress in media and policy advocacy. The platform was created with the help of DIT and Digital Empowerment Foundation who have come together to create a regional platform and had support of partners like mint newspaper, VAS companies like IMImobile, OnMobile, One97 and the umbrella organization such as IAMAI (Internet & Mobile Association of India). Pakistan Software House Association (P@SHA) was the Country Partner, Bytesforall , the Strategic Partner and CIO Pakistan, the Media Partner from our side.

21st Century World could be a cellular age going by the phenomenal increase in cell phones worldwide. The cellular age is fast accelerating with cell phones magnifying our larger identity in both individual and collective domains and in various social, cultural, economic contexts. This tremendous growth of mobile penetrations is a scene to be witnessed worldwide especially in developing countries with larger population concentration. Thus, the power of cellular technology is evident. And South Asia is and cannot be left behind. Therefore, the objective of the awards was to

• Recognise mobile innovations and creativity.
• Provide a platform for the innovations into benchmarking in the mobile industry.
• Provide a wider forum for strategic networking, alliances and partnership building.
• Provide a South Asia Congress to exchange ideas, practices and policy strengths & mobile advocacy.
• Facilitate in building a South Asia network towards campaign and advocacy in mobile for mass empowerment and inclusive growth.

The response to the mBillionth Award nomination process was phenomenal: more than 250 entries were received and after screening 165 nominations were successfully accepted: India – 121, Sri Lanka – 28, Bangladesh – 07, Pakistan – 05, Nepal – 03, and Maldives – 1. The 14 member Jury came up with 24 winners & 12 special mentions from 5 South Asian Countries.

Osama Manzar, the man behind the awards said “No business vertical or community will remain untouched by this pervasive mobile device: entrepreneurs from all sectors, community leaders from all regions and government officials from all departments are curious to know how they can leverage the mobility platform to cause transformational impact on areas of their impact and influence.”

There was an impressive line-up of eminent dignitaries, best practitioners, innovators and policy makers for various plenary sessions scheduled at the full day mBillionth Congress, Exposition and Award Gala held at Hotel InterContinental Eros in New Delhi yesterday to promote cross-border exchange of ideas, policy strengths and mobile advocacy.

EntrepreneursPK Team is extremely delighted to inform you that though there were only 5 nominations from Pakistan amongst 250 total entries, yet we won 2 awards at the mBillionth Awards 2010. The Citizen Journalism Startup, SeenReport won in the m-News & Journalism category whereas Jaroka Tele-Healthcare won in the m-Health category. We take this opportunity to congratulate SeenReport and Jaroka Teams, and are hopeful that next year we would have many more winners to make us proud. Also our gratitude goes to the Digital Empowerment Foundation for taking the lead in creating this recognition and networking platform for mobile content developers.

The list of winners of mBillionth Awards 2010 is as follows.

m-GOVERNANCE

1. Many to One SMS, INDIA www.katnidistrict.org

2. GPS/GSM Based Train Tracking System, SRI LANKA

3. Paperless Admission System of Shahjalal University of Science & Technology (SUST), BANGLADESH http://sust.edu/admission

4. M-Distribution, INDIA www.megovernance.com

m-INCLUSION

1. Dialog Tradenet, SRI LANKA http://www.tradenet.dialog.lk

2. Dakia, INDIA http://one97world.com/

3. Voice of Youth, NEPAL http://www.ccfocusone.com

4. Panini Keypad, INDIA www.paninikeypad.com

5. Nepal Wireless, NEPAL http://www.nepalwireless.net

m-NEWS & JOURNALISM

1. Reuters Market Light, INDIA http://thomsonreuters.com/

2. Gaon Ki Awaaz, INDIA http://gaonkiawaaz.wordpress.com/

3. See ’n’ Report, PAKISTAN http://seenreport.com/

4. CGNet Swara, INDIA http://audiowiki.no-ip.org/admin/playback.php

m-EDUCATION & LEARNING

1. English Seekho, INDIA http://englishseekho.in

2. Drona, INDIA www.deltecs.com

3. Ability, INDIA www.willager.com/ability

m-ENTERTAINMENT

1. 3G Play, SRI LANKA http://wavenet.lk/

2. M-Search, INDIA http://onmobile.com/

3. Colombo Ride 2.0, SRI LANKA http://games.lk

4. Mobile Antakshari, INDIA http://www.slideshare.net/rajam/mobile-antakshari

m-TRAVEL & TOURISM

1. SMS 139 Railway Enquiry, INDIA www.spicedigital.in

2. AWATAR Mobile Booking, INDIA http://www.kstrc.in

3. Suruk, INDIA http://www.suruk.com

4. MobileWishPocket Travel Assistant, INDIA http://mobilewish.com/pta

m-BUSINESS & COMMERCE

1. EKO, INDIA www.eko.co.in

2. WorldGSM™ INDIA www.vnl.in

3. Mobiquity mMoney, INDIA http://comviva.com/

4. Business Express, BANGLADESH http://batworld.com/

5. Voice ERP, INDIA http://uniphore.com/

m-HEALTH

1. Eliminating queues in OPDs in hospitals – An m-Health initiative by JPN ATC, INDIA

2. Jaroka Tele-Healthcare, PAKISTAN www.jaroka.seecs.edu.pk

3. Students Health Information Tracking System (SWHITS) for Andhra Pradesh Social Welfare Residential Educational Institutions Society (APSWREIS), INDIA http://swhits.cgg.gov.in

4. Aarogyam, INDIA http://jpnagar.nic.in/aarogyam/default.htm

m-ENVIRONMENT

1. m-Governance for Forest & Wildlife Management, INDIA

m-CULTURE & HERITAGE

No Winners

Special Awards:

Most Innovative Nomination

Ability, INDIA

Chairman’s Award for Emerging Mobile Initiative

Dhiraagu – Mobile Zakat, MALDIVES