KARACHI: Most creative minds from ICT industries and academia anticipate the largest gala of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) awards by the Pakistan Software Houses Association for IT and ITES (PASHA).

The award distribution ceremony this year took place in Karachi. The awards aim to provide acknowledgement and appreciation to the new ICT startup companies and to foster the ICT industry and learning in Pakistan.

Jehan Ara, the President of PASHA hosted the entire ceremony. She told the audience that the awards are set for 25 different categories.

“We received more than 100 entries for the nominations in different ICT categories. 2011 is also a joyful year because the whole world downloaded Pakistani brand Apps from all apps stores,” she added.

Later, Jehan Ara declared Nadeem Elahi as the new President of PASHA.

Speaking to the audience, Elahi said that they arrange ICT awards every year. Despite the challenging times and with no governmental support, Pakistan’s ICT industry has made many success stories. He said that Pasha also played an important role to develop country’s ICT policy.

Later, a lecture of the late Steve Jobs, entitled “How to live” was displayed on the screens. The participants paid rich tribute to Jobs, a tech visionary and the former founder of the Apple Company.

The winners and runners up

“Angry Monkey” and Pakistani Body Count were declared as the winner and runners up respectively in digital media and entertainment applications category.

In the E-Government Applications Category the National Air Space Management System (NASMS) from the Center for Advanced Research in Engineering (CARE) was declared as the winner and the Information System 1339 declared as runner up.

Similarly, the product of CUVI lib got the winning prize and vSwitch Pro-Carrier got the runner up prize in the Research and Development Applications Category.

3P Web & Wireless Telecom CMS & Self Care got the winning prize in the Industrial Applications Category and Store Footfall Management got runner up prize.

Software Development Framework for SDR got the winner prize and Smart NS Folio 3 was declared as runner up for the Tools and Infrastructure category.

The website Ilm ki Dunya got winner award and toffee Tv was declared as runner up in the E-learning award category.

And the other winners are Consolidated Security System in Security Applications Category, Capizar Suite of Applications got first prize in financial applications category, while Arrythmia & Sudden Death Syndrome Detection got the winner award in the e-Health Applications Category.

The product of Photo Editor was the winner in the category of Best Mobile Application.

PASHA also appreciated the innovative efforts of students in the Best Tertiary Student Project Category in which Wearable Gesture Based HCI from NED University, Intelligent Computing Engine (ICE) from NED University were declared as winners.

All winners were later requested to sign a board dubbed as “Wall of Fame” in the corner of the Hall.