World's Best app developers awarded in Abu Dhabi

A Sri Lankan learning game for medical students, a Brazilian app for deaf language communication and a Lebanese Augmented Reality app for panorama photography emerged among the best of the best in the 2013 World Summit Awards for mobile content (WSA-mobile).

The awarding ceremony was the highlight of the WSA-mobile global congress that took place February 3rd - 5th in Abu Dhabi.

WSA-mobile is the only Information and Communications Technology (ICT) event that gathers and honours mobile content developers and experts from over 160 countries.

On a biennial basis, the event provides a platform for the world's most outstanding mobile app producers to present their innovation to a high ranking audience of experts and industry leaders.

After evaluating submissions from the world's top mobile content developers representing nearly 100 UN member states, an elite group of international judges chose 40 entries that represented the crème of the crop from a pool of more than 420 products on the lead up to the Gala Night.

During the event's culminating Gala Dinner, 8 winners under the 8 content categories of m-Business, m-Government, m-Health, m-Learning, m-Media, m-Enterainment, m-Tourism and m-Inclusion as determined by a Grand Jury of global experts were feted for their ground breaking works. True to its theme of 'Meet Excellence in Mobile Content 2.0,' this year's batch of winners presented the cutting-edge in mobile apps, games, images, music and video.

WSA-mobile Chairman Peter A. Bruck congratulated the winners and stated that the three-day event had been a unique opportunity to demonstrate the huge potential of mobile applications: "The Winners of this year's WSA-mobile contest prove that what counts in a world of ten billion mobile phones is the creativity of mobile content developers."

The event in Abu Dhabi has been hosted by the Abu Dhabi Systems and Information Society. It is part of the government of Abu Dhabi's approach of transforming Abu Dhabi into a global hub for technology and innovation. The Abu Dhabi Systems and Information Centre is the government entity in charge of overseeing the modernization of Abu Dhabi's public services through the use of ICT.

The Centre is preparing to roll out over 70 technology initiatives in the coming years to further build up on its centrepiece projects which include the Abu Dhabi Spatial Data Infrastructure (AD-SDI) programme, the Jobsabudhabi.com employment portal, the 24-hour Abu Dhabi Government Contact Centre (800 555), and Abudhabi.ae, the official e-Government Portal of the emirate.