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NASA’s Space Apps Hackathon Is Back in Cairo

Back for the third year running, Space Apps is bringing together the nation's brightest minds for another melting pot of innovation.

Staff Writer

For the third consecutive year, Cairo will be hosting the International NASA Space Apps Challenge on April 29-30 at the Information Technology Institute (ITI) in Smart Village Cairo. Space Apps is the world’s largest hackathon, that brings together thousands of tech-heads worldwide each year to work with NASA in coming up with innovative solutions to the many problems faced by NASA during their operations both here and in space.

The competition harvests the many talents needed in the field of space operations for NASA, so anyone from volunteers, developers, engineers, designers, and anyone who wants to benefit their talents and interest in Earth or space to effect a positive change.

Cairo started participating in 2015, and that year it was the biggest leg of Space Apps worldwide, held at Nile University and sponsored by NTRA, Giza Systems, TIEC, Microsoft, IBM, Zoomaal, Qafeer Labs and The Planetarium Science Center and the Bibliotheca Alexandrina. It was also ranked among the most successful city hackathons worldwide, having produced the highest number of on-site solutions, as well as being the Space Apps with the most female-led projects that year.

The event was held at Zewail City on 23-24 April 2016 and sponsored by the National Authority for Remote Sensing & Space Sciences (NARSS), TIEC, Alexandria Hackerspace, Designopia, and Publicist.

“We’re reaching out to women’s organisations influential in the data and maker communities to participate, and we encourage women-led teams in the hackathon,” said Deborah Diaz, chief technology officer for information technology. The Egyptian government announced 2017 to be the Year of Women in Egypt, which highly encourages and empowers Egyptian women to participate in all aspects of life, and this year there are really high hopes for the country’s bright female minds.

This year is going to be massive just as ever, and definitely sounds like something you probably don’t want to miss. For more info on the event, check out their Facebook page or their website.