Cisco Announces Winners of IoT World Forum Young Women’s Innovation Grand Challenge

Cisco Announces Winners of IoT World Forum Young Women’s Innovation Grand Challenge

The winning IoT submission calls for a new global container management system

SAN JOSE, Calif., August 4, 2015 – Today Cisco announced the winners of the first ever IoT World Forum Young Women’s Innovation Grand Challenge.

The Young Women’s Innovation Grand Challenge is a global competition open to young women between the ages of 13-18. Participants were tasked with suggesting new IoT solutions and technologies to connect more devices and everyday objects to the internet or other networks to address challenges in education, healthcare, manufacturing, energy, retail, transportation, smart cities, or other industries.

Top winners received cash prizes for investing in their education or respective innovative ideas.

Through the competition, Cisco captured the attention of more than 1500 girls, and witnessed the diverse set of global submissions from 171 countries. The panel of judges selected the following winning entries:

1st place winner – $20,000

Summary of Idea: An innovative way to prevent smuggling illegal items and alerting customers when shipping containers are compromised or tampered with using sensors to track and send status reporting by means of software solution via an IoT Intercloud.

2nd place winners – $10,000

3rd place winners – $5,000

The Future Generation of Women in STEM

“We are thrilled to see the passion, innovation and professionalism of all participants in the challenge,” said the Executive Sponsor of the challenge, Inbar Lasser Raab, Cisco VP Products and Solutions Marketing. “We hoped that the great excitement and opportunity around the Internet of Things will appeal to young women and attract them to get involved in STEM fields. The results exceeded our expectations, demonstrating great creativity in utilizing IoT to address everyday challenges and better people’s lives.”

The Women’s Innovation Grand Challenge officially kicked off at the 2014 IoT World Forum in Chicago, and the panel of judges comprised Cisco and industry leaders who focus on women in IoT, venture capital, universities, and learning centers with an emphasis in STEM.

“Cisco’s Young Women’s Innovation Grand Challenge showcases an exceptionally high level of quality ideas that advance the Internet of Things, a wave of innovation that is expected to be more profound than the previous Internet revolution,” said Whitney Rockley, a judge for the challenge, and Co-founder and Managing Partner of McRock Capital, an industrial Internet VC fund. “McRock is passionate about inspiring more girls and women to pursue careers in STEM so this challenge gives us great insight and comfort to know that these young women will transform the world we live in.”

The Young Women’s Innovation Grand Challenge is just one example of how Cisco encourages and inspires women to pursue education and careers in STEM. As virtually every industry continues to experience an evolution of IoT, there is a continuous need for skilled workers and expertise in IoT technologies. Because of the high demand for these skills, it is imperative for women to continue their education in STEM fields and to start their journeys in related professions.

Fun Facts about STEM:

• There are roughly 26 million STEM jobs in the U.S. alone
• STEM jobs comprise 20 percent of all U.S. jobs
• Metro areas with higher STEM knowledge have stronger economies

See full study here.

Cisco’s main goal was to increase IoT awareness and STEM interest among young women through positive experiences in an IoT competition. To that end, the IoT World Forum Young Women’s Innovation Grand Challenge supports Cisco’s corporate social responsibility goal to build IT talent and cultivate STEM education and careers needed to build tomorrow’s workforce. See more at: http://csr.cisco.com/pages/stem-at-cisco#sthash.n8A8KfnN.dpuf

Overview of top 20 semi-finalists for Women’s Innovation Grand Challenge

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#GirlsforIoTinnovation

About Cisco
Cisco (NASDAQ:CSCO, news, filings) is the worldwide leader in IT that helps companies seize the opportunities of tomorrow by proving that amazing things can happen when you connect the previously unconnected. For ongoing news, please go to http://newsroom.cisco.com.

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