Jury

The international experts jury evaluates all the entries in a multi-step procedure.

In the first and second round of judging, projects are evaluated online and a shortlist of about ten finalists per category is generated. While these first two rounds of evaluation will be done by a panel of experts for each category, the final decisions will be done by the plenary of the Grand Jury. Five projects in each of the categories will be selected as the Winners of the WSA-mobile 2010.

Jury members have backgrounds in the creative industries, telecommunication, advertising, journalism and research, as well as in teaching.

GRAND JURY MODERATION

Mr. PETER A. BRUCK, AUSTRIA
Moderator

Peter A. Bruck works as CEO and Chief Researcher of the Research Studios Austria Forschungsgesellschaft which is mandated by the Austrian Ministry for Science and Research to manage the innovation from universities into markets. He is Honorary President of the International Centre for New Media (ICNM), Salzburg, Chairman of the Board of the European Academy of Digital Media (EADiM), Netherlands, and Chairman of the Board of Directors of the World Summit Award. Mr Bruck studied at the universities of Vienna, Iowa and McGill, Montreal. He holds doctorates in Law and Communications, and master degrees in Sociology and Economics. He has taught at universities in Canada, the US and Western Europe plus Israel and Poland and has over 25 years of experience in research and consulting in Austria, Switzerland, Germany, Poland, Portugal, the US and Canada. Mr Bruck has founded the University of Applied Sciences in Salzburg, headed research institutes at universities and national research organisations in Canada and Austria, and initiated EUROPRIX, Europe’s leading multimedia award. Mr. Bruck has worked in business and industry and on the Board of Management of the Telekom Austria as the Chief Content Officer for the Group and the head of the business division of interactive media for two years. Within the framework of the UN World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), Mr Bruck has organised the World Summit Award in e-Content and Creativity as a global event and process since 2003.

Mr. GABRIEL DEEK, LEBANON
Co-moderator

As founder and CEO of Digital Media Solutions Companies and Manager of e-Business Solutions Activities for the past 20 years, Gabriel Deek was involved in multiple projects related to e-Business Infrastructure, Multimedia, Advanced Collaboration, Video Production and Post-Production, and News-Room Automation Systems. He is the General Manager of OmniSystems sal., an affiliate company to OmniTech Holdings and MDS Holdings. While keeping a close relationship with the Academia, he joined the PCA in 1996. President since March 2007 he acts on community initiatives aiming to bridge the Digital Divide. He also chairs the Organizing Committee of the Golden Chip Awards since its creation in 1999. This competition is intended to discover and support young talents and promote their work in the business community. Within the WSA network, Gabriel is one of the oldest and most dedicated members. He has organized a number of national events, including a best e-Content Road Show Conference in Beirut, Lebanon in 2004, served as the Grand Jury member in 2003 and 2005, and later as an invited moderator at the WSA national contests in Bahrain and Kuwait, and since 2008 holding a position of a WSA Special Ambassador.

GRAND JURY MEMBERS

Mr. NAWAF M. ABDULRAHMAN, BAHRAIN
Chief of Information Technology, General Organisation for Youth & Sport

Nawaf M. Abdulrahman is Chief of Information Technology in the General Organization for Youth & Sport, Vice President of Bahrain Internet Society and Head of the Jury & Technical Committee in Bahrain e-Content Award Nawaf ousts 12 years of experience in the IT field with proven ability to manage large scale projects through the entire lifecycle.Nawaf has an MBA with concentration in Finance & Bachelor in Information Technology; he is also CISA, ITIL & MCSE.

He worked in many project through Bahrain Internet Society such as IT Future Leaders pr the e-Citizens which aims to train the citizen in basic computing. Furthermore, he worked in many projects through his professional career such as a unique unified communications solution which is considered the first of its kind in the Middle East. Awaf conducted several courses, workshops and lectures in IT related topics such as "Users Awareness in Information Technology", "How Information Technology Empowering People" and "The Information Technology and The Youth Opportunities".
 

Ms. MANAR AL-HASHASH, KUWAIT
Secretary General, Kuwait e-Award

Manar Al-Hashash is the Founder and Project & Marketing Manager of Dot Design, a software development company. She has also launched the IT magazine Dot, of which she is the owner and Chief Editor. In 2004, Ms Al-Hashash launched and managed a local e-Content contest, the Ghiras Electro Contest 2004, which was aimed at youths in Kuwait (14-22 years old), competing for best website design, best presentation and best graphic design. She was awarded an IEEE for her outstanding Internet and e-Commerce projects in 2000. Ms Al-Hashash is in charge of and presents the weekly IT programme Compunet World on the Kuwait Satellite Channel in Arabic and an IT programme on KTV2 in English called Zero Ones. She also writes a weekly IT column for the Al-Watan newspaper.

MR. SULEMAN BAKHSH, UAE
Senior ICT Analyst, Telecommunication Regulation Authority (TRA)

Eng. Suleman Bakhsh, a young, experienced and active engineer, holds a Masters degree in Business Administration (MBA) and a Bachelor degree of Electronic Engineering. He works for the UAE Telecommunication Regulatory Authority as a Senior Information and Communication Technologies Analyst.
Eng. Suleman supervises and manages many projects as a project manager and a technology analyst where various studies, policy development, comparative analysis and benchmarking is conducted. He is also heavily involved in internet technologies, telecom market advancements, cyber security, and Internet Governance.
Eng. Suleman has been representing UAE in various International Telecommunication Union (ITU) Meetings and Conferences such as IPv6 working group and WSIS Annual conferences. He coordinates the work of the UAE National World Summit of Information Society (WSIS) Committee for the WSIS follow up, and is an active member in many other groups and committees.

Mr. RAINER BABIEL, GERMANY
CEO, Babiel GmbH

Dr. Rainer Babiel is general manager of the Babiel GmbH, which he co-founded in 1991. His company is a consultancy and agency for online communications, which implemented its first mobile web solutions in 1999. In addition to various industry clients in Europe, Dr. Babiel has worked as a consultant for the governments of Austria, Germany, Luxembourg and Slovenia. He and his agency realized ambitious internet projects for them. In 2007, Babiel GmbH won the WSA for the German Parliament website. Dr. Rainer Babiel postgraduated in Business Informatics and Marketing Studies at the University of Münster and doctorates about Content Management Systems. He is Adjunct Professor for Economics and Marketing at the University of Applied Sciences Cologne/Bielefeld (Germany). Currently his interests are focused on mobile internet and social media.

MR. MATHIEU  FLAMANT, BRAZIL
Founder & Managing Director, OpenMundi

Mathieu Flamant is the Founder and Managing Director of OpenMundi, a technology development and consulting firm with offices in France and in Brazil. Mathieu has over 10 years experience in the Internet and Telecom sectors, advising and providing services for large players and for start-ups in Europe and Latin America, with a focus on innovation and value-creating processes based on IT and wireless technologies.  Earlier, Mathieu was senior consultant in charge of the services and uses related to mobile and broadband access specialized in IT/Telecom for non-commercial sectors such as Health, Education and eGovernment. He covered conferences in North America and Europe, wrote various reports on mobile and Internet trends and produced a monthly newsletter. Mathieu also founded and runs MobileMonday Rio de Janeiro, a series of not-profit networking events focused on innovation and presenting the latest trends related to mobile in Brazil.

Mr. AMR KAMEL, EGYPT

Founder & Chairman, Global Technologies Online

Amr worked 7 years at the Egyptian Cabinet Information and Decision support Center (IDSC), before he joined Vodafone Egypt in 1999. In early 2002, he was promoted to Sr. Manager for Products & Services, responsible for developing and managing the Vodafone portfolio of mobile value added services and products revenues. He led the team that developed and launched Egypt’s first multi-access portal providing a host of services and applications to users via web, wap and SMS push/pull.  Later he lead the team that launched Vodafone live!TM, that at the time was the first graphical mobile internet site in Egypt (and one of the first in the world after Vodafone UK, Germany and Italy). During his time at Vodafone Amr also worked on location based services, m-payment, SIM toolkit apps, while also building and establishing its SMS 3rd party strategy and partners services.
In 2006 he went private and established Global Technologies Online (GTO), as Shareholding Company providing off-shore development services to the Canadian based WSI franchise network with more than 1,500 Internet Consultants in 80+ countries. In 2009, with the launch of the iphone, GTO focused its efforts in the mobile application development, with an emphasis on mobile enablement services and applications. Amr is happily married and has 3 children.
 

Mr. THOM KENNON, USA  
VP Global  Strategy, Wunderman USA

Thom is a frequent contributor to digital marketing trade press and participant on digital panels. He has over 20 years of direct and interactive marketing experience. A veteran of the digital marketing industry, Thom has founded, launched or lead three interactive agencies over his career. Since joining Wunderman in early 2007, Thom has provided digital and all-channel strategic planning oversight across the client portfolio, including Microsoft, Citibank, Hewlett-Packard, Nationwide, Diageo, Dannon and more. At Wunderman, Thom has led the creation of a social media practice group grounded in the rigor of digital direct response. He and his team have developed a new model for insights development – the Listening Platform – using complex gathering, analytics & modeling tools to organize and translate the noise of the social media “wild” into new campaign planning, execution and optimization methodologies for emerging platforms. Thom has recently assumed the global digital strategy lead for Wunderman’s newest global AOR – Nokia. Before joining the Wunderman team in 2007, Kennon led the client services division of iCrossing, a leading, global, digital marketing agency. He also created and grew the strategy practice, developing digital business strategies for a range of Fortune 500 brands including American Express, McGraw-Hill, Colgate-Palmolive, CitiGroup, Daimler-Chrysler and Novartis. Thom’s innovative digital acquisition program for Colgate’s full portfolio of oral, home and health care product remains cutting edge for CPG bands online, seeking to leverage advanced linguistic analysis for informing content, targeting and media strategies to increase reach, awareness and customer loyalty through the web.
 

Mr. RODOLFO LADDAGA, MEXICO
CEO & Co-Founder, U-Tour

Rodolfo Laddaga, or "Rudy", is Mexican, born 1972 in Mexico City. From childhood on, he showed interest for film and computers. At the age of 13 years he finished a technical course as Programmer and Systems Analyst, since then the technology has been part of his professional life.
He graduated with honours from the Tecnológico de Monterrey with a Bachelor in Communication Sciences and later started a master’s degree at New York University (NYU) in the Interactive Telecommunications Program. In 2000 he abandoned his studies when he developed the first digital cinema poster, the Virtual Board, a product that was embraced by the international company Cinemark in order to be installed in their theatres all over the world. To start this endeavour, he partnered with Alejandro Machorro and founded Media Innovations, the first Digital Signage Company in Latin America that became the number four worldwide in 2005.
Rudy also studied film and has participated in several film projects. His work has been screened at international film festivals. Furthermore, he has been a professor at several universities teaching courses on Multimedia and Digital Cinema.
All of his projects, ever since he started his first company, are related to information and communications technologies. His passion for that field has led him to collaborate with the World Summit Award since 2005, first as a National Expert and now as a Board Member.
In 2007 he founded U-TOUR with Alejandro Machorro to develop multimedia guided tours. The company was awarded in 2009 with the World Summit Award in the e-Culture category and also with the 2009 DELL AMERICAN EXPRESS Small Business Award for the most innovative company. In 2010 Rudy and Alejandro were named "Entrepreneurs of the Year". Rudy is married to Lorena. Together they hold a small NGO called Constelación Mascota (Pet Constellation).

Ms. ANU LYRA, FINLAND
My Nokia SW concept owner, Nokia Corporation

Ms. Anu Lyra is Digital Marketing Manager at Nokia since January 2009, taking care of relationship marketing, CRM, sales promotion, mobile and web content creation. Prior to that, she was Marketing Manager at Nokia with responsibilities in digital marketing, campaign creation and project management. She holds an BA of Arts in Media & Film as well as an MBA in Digital Business Management.

Mr. OSAMA MANZAR, INDIA
Founder and Director, Digital Empowerment Foundation

Osama is a convert social entrepreneur spearheading the mission to overcome the information barrier between India’s rural sector, and the so-called developed society, through Digital Empowerment Foundation (DEF) –– the not-for-profit organisation founded to accomplish the mission; www.defindia.net. In 2003, he launched India’s first ever award for choosing the best e-content practices in India and South Asia. Osama is the Chairman of the Manthan Award for Best e-Content for Development; www.manthanaward.org. He has authored titles like “e-Content: Voices from the Ground” (www.econtentworldwide.org). “Internet Economy of India” and “India’s Best e-Contents”. Manzar is e-Content Expert for India for the World Summit Award (WSA), as well as Grand Jury Member and member of Board of Directors; www.wsis-award.org. He has been a part of the Professional Social Entrepreneurship Program by Social-Impact International; Osama has worked through Computerworld as assistant editor, head of interactive media division of Hindustan Times and started a software company 4Cplus, for media publishers and quit the same to get into social entrepreneurship through DEF. He is a physics graduate and post graduate in Journalism. He was awarded a joint Chevening/Young Indian IT Professional Programme 2002 Scholarship by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office to study Advanced IT Management Programme at Manchester Business School, University of Manchester from 2001-2002.
 

Ms. CHITRANGANIE MUBARAK, SRI LANKA
Senior Programme Head, ICT Agency of Sri Lanka

Chitranganie holds a second class (upper) in Chemistry from the University of Colombo. With over 20 years' experience in formulating and implementing national Programmes for export development and promotion, Chitranganie has spear-headed several key export oriented initiatives besides coordinating several donor-funded programmes of the EDB. As Director of TradenetSL, the e-commerce arm of the Sri Lanka Export Development, Chitranganie was responsible for introducing several ICT solutions for facilitating the rural entrepreneur and has played a key role in launching the country's pioneering online trading platform.
She is presently Programme Head at the Information Communication Technology Agency of Sri Lanka, the apex body responsible for ICT policy and direction in Sri Lanka and the implementing organization for the e-Sri Lanka Initiative. Her main focus is the e-Society Programme which seeks to ensure that the dividends of ICT reach all sections of society. Several highly innovative ICT applications/contents of relevance to society have been developed and deployed through this programme.  She has presented Sri Lanka’s ICT4D experience at several international fora including the Global Knowledge Partnership (GKP) Conferences, Annual Regional Meetings of One World South Asia, the Forum for Information Technology Nepal, the ICT4D Conference of the Centre for Advanced Computing, C-DAC, and in global video conferencing sessions of the World Bank.
 

Mr. SIMPSON POON, HONG KONG/CHINA
Director of the Applied Research Office, Hong Kong Vocational Training Council (VTC)

Professor Simpson Poon, PhD., is currently Director of the Applied Research Office of the Hong Kong Vocational Training Council (VTC). Before working in Hong Kong, he was a Sub-Dean and Chair Professor (Level E) of Information Systems in Australia. He has been awarded a Justice of the Peace of Australia. Professor Poon has over 20 years of experience in business consulting, management and has provided leadership in both the academic and business domains. He has published widely in both the Business and IT areas. Professor Poon has been a visitor to many international institutions such as: Harvard University, Stanford University, University of Pennsylvania, University of California, Berkeley; London School of Economics, University of Strathclyde (Scotland), National University of Singapore, Nanyang Technological University (Singapore) and the University of Hong Kong. He is a Founding Member of the Hong Kong Professionals and Senior Executives Association, a member of the Chinese Executive Club of the HK Management Association; the Hong Kong Institute of Directors; the HK Society of Registered Financial Planners, a Vice-President of the Internet Professionals' Association and a Fellow of the IT Accountants Association. He is also a senior member of the Australian Computer Society.
 

Ms. RAPELANG RABANA, SOUTH AFRICA
Co-Founder & Chief Executive Officer, Yeigo Communications

Rapelang Rabana is just 26 years old, but has made great strides in the business world, and she's doing things her own way, too. She has some invaluable advice for any woman interested in starting her own business. When she was only 23, Rapelang started her own business, and she has been named as one of "200 Young South Africans You Must Take To Lunch" by the Mail & Guardian. This year the Research and Development arm of Swiss headquartered TelFree Communications, under its Global Head of R&D, Rapelang Rabana, launched the world’s first unified telecommunications hub which is now available on the Apple iPhone and the Apple iPod Touch. Rapelang is Co-Founder & Chief Executive Officer at Yeigo Communications, which specializes in the development, implementation and marketing of software-based communications solutions that take full advantage of convergence trends within the mobile arena. The company’s core business strategy is focused on partnering with internet and telecoms service providers with the intention of offering mobile communication solutions as an integrated part of their own service offering.
 

Mr. MADANMOHAN RAO, INDIA/SINGAPORE
Mobile Monday, Chief Researcher

Dr Rao has edited three book series: “The Asia Pacific Internet Handbook”, “The Knowledge Management Chronicles” and “AfricaDotEdu” (McGraw Hill). He is also editor-at-large of DestinationKM.com and contributor to the Poynter Institute blog on new media trends. Madan was on the international editorial board of the recently published book, “Transforming e-Knowledge" and "Asia Unplugged". Madan has been the communications director at the United Nations Inter Press Service bureau in New York, and vice president at IndiaWorld Communications in Bombay. He graduated from the Indian Institute of Technology at Bombay and the University of Massachusetts at Amherst ,USA, with an M.S. in computer science and a Ph.D. in communications. He is currently the director of the InfoComm Observatory at the Indian Institute of Information Technology, Bangalore. Madan is a frequent speaker at international conferences, having given talks and lectures in over 60 countries around the world. He has worked with online services in the U.S., Brazil, and India. His articles have appeared in DestinationKM.com, The Economic Times, Electronic Markets magazine, Economic and Political Weekly, and the Bangkok Post.
 

Ms. KATRI RISTAL, ESTONIA
Director of Marketing, Estonian Open Air Museum

Katri Ristal has been involved in many innovative activities in Estonia. She is one of the founders and the CEO (1999-2003) of wireless broadband company Norby Telecom, today operating in all three Baltic countries. In 2004 she headed to a “softer” field to kick-start Design Innovation Center. Katri is one of the authors of the vision document "Creative city - creative Tallinn" and is a representative of the World Summit Award in Estonia. Today, Katri is working as Director of Marketing at the Estonian Open Air Museum realising her slogan "Tradition is well introduced innovation".

Mr.  MOHAMMED SAAD LAIB, ALGERIA

General Manager, DIDACTICA

Mr. Mohamed SAAD LAIB is an international consultant in ICT4D he is the General Manager of DIDACTICA, Higher School of Management and IT in Algeria and one of founders of AL AWAEL Education and Learning (Primary, College and Secondary school). Both are leader institutions in Algeria using ICT in their curricula since the beginning of the 90's of the past century. His activities are mainly oriented to use ICT4D in education and learning and how to set policies and strategies to reach targets in the high level of decision and policy makers. Mr Mohamed SAAD LAIB is the MENA (Middle East and North Africa) regional coordinator of GKP (Global Knowledge Partnership, http://www.globalknowledge.org ) and a member of membership committee.
 

Mr. KEI SHIMADA, JAPAN
Founder and CEO, Infinita Inc

Kei is in charge of all international client relations, business development and strategies at the world’s leading mobile augmented reality application provider. He is Founder and CEO of Infinita Inc. since February 2005 and until present. Kei also founded and managed one of Japan´s very few multinational mobile companies that cover development, research and consulting areas for both Japanese and International clients. He managed a team consisting of American, German and Japanese nationals. He was Head for all domestic and international sales, product and service strategies, and all managerial responsibilities. Prior to that, Kei worked for Cybird Co., Ltd., in Corporate Planning Dept, International Business Department, Business Development Department and the Mobile Content Division.
 

Mr. RALPH SIMON, UNITED KINGDOM / USA 
Founder & Chairman Emeritus, MEF - Mobile Entertainment Forum

Ralph Simon is regarded as one of the founders of the modern mobile entertainment industry.  After enjoying an auspicious and successful career in the record and music publishing industry developing the industry’s most significant independent group of music companies (Zomba and Jive Records), Ralph then went on to found EMI’s New Media division, when he was Executive Vice President of Capitol Records and Blue Note Records in the mid 90’s.  He was responsible for starting the first ring tone company in the USA, UK, Europe, Africa and Australia (Yourmobile/Moviso) in 1999.  Ralph founded MEF Americas and has played a central role in the development of the mobile entertainment industry in the USA and globally.  He was named one of the world’s Top 50 executives in mobile entertainment in both 2005 and 2006 by the influential trade magazine, Mobile Entertainment.  In July 2005, he produced and organized the mobile layer of the Live 8 global concert phenomenon that influenced G8 leaders to provide $50bn to reduce poverty in Africa.  Ralph created the science of “Mociology” and “Mocio-Economics” and established the world’s first professional chair in Mociology at the Da Vinci Institute for Technology Management  to address the core issues of the mobile industry in Africa.  Based in London, with offices in Berlin and Los Angeles, Ralph works as a strategic creative and business advisor to major media companies, brands, entertainment companies  and content owners through his involvement with Iconmobile, the respected mobile entertainment innovation architects.  He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts in the UK, and a member of the National Academy of Recorded Arts & Sciences in the USA

Ms. ANYA SVERDLOV, RUSSIAN FEDERATION
Managing Director, Actis Systems

Anya Sverdlov is the Managing Director of Actis Wunderman, Russia's top digital agency, member of the Wunderman network and part of the WPP family. Prior to joining the Actis team, Ms. Sverdlov's professional experience included three years on Wall Street at Kemper Securities, Inc. and more than three years in strategy management consulting with A.T. Kearney (working in the US, Russia, Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Sweden and Denmark), where she managed large projects in the financial services and consumer goods sectors. Ms. Sverdlov holds a BA degree in Economics and Political Science (magna cum laude) from Yale University and an MBA degree in Finance and Multinational Management (with Distinction) from Wharton Business School.
 

Mr. BRENDAN TANSEY, UNITED KINGDOM
Wunderman UK, CEO Brendan started his first digital agency in 1995 in Sydney. The agency won as the best online agency 4 years running. Building on this success and client opportunity, Brendan went on to build a network of digital agencies across Asia and in 1998 Brendan became APAC director of digital at Euro RSCG. The travel bug continued to bite and in 1999 Brendan set off for New York to lead global business development for Euro RSCG Interaction. In 2001, Brendan was asked to head to Paris and London to run the Intel account through the line in EMEA and run the network of digital agencies in Europe. After merging in the Circle.com agencies in Europe and rationalizing the Digital offering in London, Brendan was asked to return to his homeland, Australia, to turn around the Euro RSCG agencies there. Two and half years later with margin increased many times and new business momentum restored, he could not stay away from London any longer and embraced the opportunity to run Wunderman U.K. as a hub of the greater network. Prior to Euro RSCG, Brendan ran his own business and worked at Ogilvy & Mather for 7 years in their retail, direct marketing and advertising divisions. Brendan is a fellow of the Royal Society of Arts through which he stays current with debate in the community and thought leaders in the UK.