Pakistan’s network team two on Thursday won the grand prize, alongside the Qatar cloud team and Kazakhstan in the Regional Ffinal of Huawei ICT 2023-24 Middle East and Central concluded at Bahrain Polytechnic.
The first prize was claimed by Bahrain’s computing team, Kazakhstan’s cloud team, and Lebanon’s network team.
Jordan and Iraq’s computing teams won the 2nd prize, Pakistan and Lebanon’s cloud teams won the 2nd prize, with Bahrain and Iraq’s network teams taking home the 2nd prize.
The third prize was won by Saudi Arabia, Oman, and Lebanon’s computing teams, Iraq and Saudi Arabia’s cloud teams, and Jordan, UAE, Saudi Arabia, and Kuwait’s network teams.
The price was distributed by Shaikh Nasser bin Hamad Al Khalifa, the King’s Representative for Humanitarian Work and Youth Affairs, and the University of Bahrain among the winners.
More than 27,500 students from over 600 universities across 21 Middle Eastern & Central Asian countries have participated in this year’s Middle East & Central Asia Huawei ICT Competition – marking the highest level of participation in the seven-year competition history.
Instructor of the winning grand prize team Faheem played a pivotal role in motivating and guiding the winning team. Faheem highlighted the challenges faced by Pakistani students due to the education system’s lack of quality and emphasized the need for students to work harder than their international counterparts.
Despite the difficulties, he expressed confidence in maintaining momentum and making improvements in the upcoming competitions. Faheem discussed the tough nature of the Middle East’s network exam and the even more challenging global competition exam.
He acknowledged the need for improvement and hard work, especially considering the relative marking system in the global competition.
The winning team’s students, Muhammad Bilal Gul and Muhammad Usman shared their journey, starting from competing with over 14,000 students in Pakistan to reaching the global finals.
They highlighted the challenges faced during the national finals and the intense interview process, describing it as a do-or-die situation. Despite the unexpected difficulties in the lab exam during Bahrain’s competition, the team devised a strategy and successfully secured the grand prize.
They expressed gratitude to Allah and their team, emphasizing their preparation to win the global finals.
The Pakistani team that won the 2nd prize included Onkar, Zeeshan, Saagar, and Asfandyar Jamali, three of whom were from NUST and enrolled in CS and Engineering programs. They described their journey from discovering the ICT Competition at NUST through a seminar to successfully securing the 2nd position in the cloud track.
