SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY FACULTY WINS THAILAND STUDENT .NET CUP

Group photo of President Dr. Bancha Saenghiran, ICT Minister H.E. Surapong Suebwonglee, Microsoft CEO Mr. McBean, faculty members andprize-winning students.

Information and Communication Technology Minister HE. Surapong Suebwonglee, Microsoft (Thailand) CEO Mr. Andrew McBean andprize-winning students.

President Dr. Bancha Saenghiran, Microsoft (Thailand) CEO. Mr. Andrew McBean, S & T faculty and students who won the 2004 award

Four students of the Science and Technology Faculty made history by winning the 2004 Thailand Student .NET Cup. Altogether 22 teams participated in the competition but only 5 teams reached the final round. Assumption University which developed the Pocket PC software application named "Where2Go" has won the Thailand championship.

The team comprises of

• Mr. Jirawat Padung-kijjanon and Mr. Tanapol Pavada-chochai from Computer Science Department and
• Mr. ChadchavalTreeya-nuwat and Mr. Kitti Phongpirun from Information Technology Department. This project was under the supervision of three faculty members who are Sanguan Thammarojsakul, Supannika Koolmanojwong and Bordin Charoenpongchai.

The "Where2Go" is a smart application that serves tourists with travel planning and adhoc travel assistance. The Where2Go can be installed in a Portable Pocket PC, retrieving fresh data by connecting with Database Server. The Where2Go connects the following intelligence functions:

• Smart Attraction Search
• Smart Hotel and Restaurant Search
• Attraction Bookmark
• Intelligent Scheduler
• Auto Scheduling
• Location Based Information

These intelligence functions are equipped with the well known Fuzzy Systems and Genetic Algorithms. The other outstanding characteristics of Where2Go are smart, easy-to-use, flexible, nice-looking-feeling user interface.

In view of the above achievements the Where2Go project was accepted for funding by Microsoft Corporation to fly to Brazil to compete at international level in July 2004. The winner of world class level will get $ 25,000 and has a chance to work with Microsoft Corporation.

On June 17,2004, the team received a testimonial plaque signed by Pol. Lt. Col. Thaksin Shinawatra, Prime Minister and a scholarship award from Microsoft (Thailand). Moreover, Faculty of Science and Technology was presented with a computer server from Microsoft (Thailand), too. The awards were presented by Dr. Surapong Sueb-wonglee, Minister of Information and Communication Technology.

Faculty of Science and Technology is very proud of our talented students and we hope that the winning team will inspire their friends to adapt the knowledge gained from the project to their real life work.

Reported by Supanika K.