Huawei Apps UP contest seeks best developers in Africa and Middle East

According to a report commissioned by Mastercard, the Middle East and Africa region is proving to be rich ground for app development — and if you're one of the region’s rising dev stars, now’s the time to show off your skills.

Huawei recently kicked off the 2022 edition of Apps UP, its global app innovation contest, which offers you the chance to win huge cash prizes and the opportunity to have your app featured in the Huawei AppGallery — one of the world’s top three app marketplaces.

Themed “together we innovate”, this competition also enables developers from diverse backgrounds to learn about HMS core, a mobile service framework that opens up a variety of service capabilities to app developers.

Providing solutions to multiple industries, HMS Core continues to build innovative experiences and multi-terminal, cross-OS, full-scene innovative and open capabilities.

In 2021, the total number of registered Huawei developers worldwide reached 5.4-million and by March 2022, more than 203,000 applications were integrated with HMS Core worldwide.

On top of the cash prizes, developers will have access to development tools, workshops, support and mentorship from Huawei experts.

Here's everything you need to know about Apps UP 2022

The Apps UP 2022 features a cash prize pool of R3.84m for developers in the Middle East and Africa, with individual prize amounts ranging from R83,543 to R250,629. 

Beyond cash, the winners’ app will feature on the AppGallery, which has more than 730-million users with Huawei mobile devices.

How the competition works 

The Apps UP competition will run until December, with exciting milestones along the way.

Contestants can enter individually or as part of a team of up to three members across eight categories, which include the following:

• Best HMS innovation award
• Best app
• Best game
• Best social impact app
• All-scenario coverage award,
• Tech women’s award,
• Student innovation award
• Best Arabic app. 

Teams with at least one female developer who is a key team member or leader, are eligible to apply for the tech women’s award. 

To qualify for the categories, participants must combine their app with HMS open capabilities or services via the team leader’s account. Developers need to integrate at least one HMS open capability kit or service and must ensure the app runs seamlessly on HMS devices.

Following a combination of public voting and a review by judges who are industry leaders from each region, the winners will be announced in December.

Developers can enter multiple categories and submit more than one app to boost their chances of winning.

To register and learn more about the Huawei Global App Innovation Contest (Apps UP), email appsup.mea@huawei.com or visit the official Apps UP 2022 MEA page.

Developers can submit their entries until 6pm UTC+8, on October 9.

This article was paid for by Huawei.