Red Hat Challenge@Labs in Asia Pacific launched

In collaboration with the Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore (IDA), this year's challenge will be relaunched as Red Hat Challenge@Labs and will kick off in July. 

A total of seven participating countries including China, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, and Thailand, will open the Challenge to what Red Hat expects will be the largest number of students since its inception in 2011. 

The theme for this year's Red Hat Challenge@Labs is “Smart Living, Smart Homes”, a concept consistent with building smart cities of the future. 

A recent report released by IDC forecasted 2014 as the year for Smart Cities.

In the report, Ruthbea Yesner Clarke, Research Director, IDC Government Insights Smart Cities Strategies, said: "This is going to be a big year for Smart Cities. Cities will move more quickly from research and evaluation to investment in pilots and the organizational structures to support Smart City initiatives.”

The Red Hat Challenge@Labs aims to challenge students to develop smart home solutions for these smart cities while helping to address business challenges enterprises face in the world today and in the future with the use of open source technology.

The format of this year’s competition has evolved to emphasize real world experience while applying today’s computing environments. Together with Red Hat, IDA and the Institution of Engineers Singapore (IES) will be providing guidance to all the students during the course of the Challenge. 

Registration for Red Hat Challenge@Labs started on July 1, 2014 and will close on July 11, 2014 and is open to all full-time students from tertiary institutions such as universities, polytechnics, and private schools in China, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan and Thailand. The winner(s) will be announced at the finale to be held in Singapore on December 15, 2014.

Dirk-Peter van Leeuwen, senior vice president and general manager, Red Hat Asia Pacific, said the challenge has given students and schools an opportunity to learn, build, and create. 

“This year, Red Hat wanted to move up a notch and go beyond the use of open source technologies in the real world. This challenge provides our next-generation of IT professionals the opportunity to experience community-powered innovation through open collaboration and knowledge exchange on a regional platform. We want to continue to bring together innovative minds, foster greater collaborations and discover tech talents to strengthen the open source community. With the support of IDA, we believe the students will benefit immensely and gain real-world experience from open source experts and IES's engineers as well,” he said.