Press Room
>World Economic Forum recognizes our work with a Young Global Leader nomination
>We are very happy today as the World Economic Forum has announced that our CEO, David del Ser, has been nominated a Young Global Leader in 2011:
Geneva, Switzerland– The World Economic Forum has announced its Young Global Leaders (YGLs) for 2011. The honour, bestowed each year by the Forum, recognizes and acknowledges up to 200 outstanding young leaders from around the world for their professional accomplishments, commitment to society and potential to contribute to shaping the future of the world.
For 2011, the Forum has selected 190 Young Global Leaders from 65 countries and all stakeholders of society (business, civil society, social entrepreneurs, politics and government, arts and culture, and opinion and media). The new class represents all regions: East Asia (50), South Asia (18), Europe (42), Middle East and North Africa (13), sub-Saharan Africa (14), North America (37) and Latin America (16). This year’s selection has more gender parity than ever, with 44% women.
You can see the list of all the nominees here. We are very excited about the great opportunity this represents for Frogtek. Getting connected to such an amazing community will surely help us bring our innovation to more and more shopkeepers.
>The Spread of Android
>The Android team at Google has just produced a video that shows the growth of new activations of Android phones throughout the world. It’s very impressive to see how from a trickle in late 2008, users are now coming to the platform in floods, in particular after the Motorola Droid came out. You can even see how the major urban centers like New York or Paris are the first ones to adopt, followed by smaller cities.
Of course, the action right now is mostly taking place in the richer countries. But you can already see a nice amount of activity in Latin America, most of Asia and even Africa. The question is, when will the trickle there take off. What phone will play the role of the Droid in Mexico, for instance?
But there is no question that the flood is coming and that raises the hope to quickly close the digital divide. At Frogtek we are extremely excited and will be expecting it with excellent apps for the Base of the Pyramid.
>We have won the mWomen App Challenge!!
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Today at the Mobile World Congress awards ceremony our CTO Guillermo picked up the award for the best smartphone application that benefits women at the Base Of the Pyramid. As you can see in the picture, the award comes with a generous check of $10,000.
We participated in the online challange, competing with a total of 63 entries from all over the world. You can see the video we prepared to describe our application here.
Other than the great recognition and funds, we’ll get special access to Carmel, a venture capital firm, and to Frog Design, a design consultancy.
So THANK YOU so much GSMA!! And special thanks go to Vodafone, Guillermo’s and my former employer, who sponsored the challenge.
UPDATE The official press release from the GSMA can be found here
>Expanding the Moral Sphere
>Two weeks ago Echoing Green held its annual conference for all its Fellows. It was a great break to get together with friends and fellow social entrepreneurs, learn about each other’s exciting developments and strengthen the bonds of a fantastic community.
As part of the weekend activities, EG hosted a Be Bold Summit with ten presentations at a beautiful venue in UT’s campus. I was invited to speak and decided to focus on the history of social entrepreneurship through a concept borrowed from Peter Singer: the expanding moral sphere.
Here you can see a video with the complete chat: