Anyone can apply.  We want to showcase our area to visitors, journalists and business people coming into the east end of London.  We’re hoping our local digital community will be creating apps, but no one is excluded from entering as long as they are creating something for our local area.

Follow these three simple steps:
ONE Follow the Apply Now link on the raceforapps.com home page to the IC tomorrow _connect platform.
TWO Register your details and join the Race for Apps group. This will give you access the application form and guidance documents.
THREE Finally, complete one side of A3 (or 2*A4) with details of your app idea and upload it with your answers to the application form.

Both concepts and finished apps – and everything in between.
The judges will be considering app concepts, existing apps that are being tweaked to bring a local focus, as well as apps that are already finished.

An application that can run on a mobile device or on a web browser. We are totally open and not aligned to any platform but would be prefer people to enter applications that run on Android, iOS (iPhone and iPad’s operating system), Blackberry, or that run on the web and are optimised for mobile viewing.

The competition launches on October 5th 2011. See raceforapps.com for further information.

For each of the five categories we race in two stages – the heats and then the finals.

During the heats, the assessors pick the first eight entrants that are assessed to be high enough quality and these move to the next stage – the finals. Once we have eight quality entrants the category closes.

In the finals we race the eight entrants against one another – We will be offering the opportunity of meeting tech investors, partners and mentors to give the finalists the best chance to become fully realised products by April 2012. We will be drawing on the partner networks of the Technology Strategy Board and Digital Shoreditch that number 15,000+ specialists.

Then in April the judges will consider all the apps in each category and the top 3 will be selected. The Gold, Silver and Bronze medals will be awarded at Digital Shoreditch in a purpose built EXPO centre Hackney House next year.

The competition will launch in October 2011, with entrants able to apply straight away. We will keep each Challenge category open until we have eight finalists for each category.

We envisage that all the categories will have closed by mid December 2011. This is a first past the post race, so do not leave your application until it’s too late. We will endeavour to update the raceforapps.com web site with the current heat qualifiers and number of remaining slots as the race progresses, but it is your responsibility not to leave it too late.

Once each category closes we will link up entrants that need support with a network of potential collaborators, investors and mentors.

In April 2012, the judges will consider all the apps and decide on the Gold, Silver and Bronze winners in each category.

We are selecting our judging panel at the moment – we are looking for highly respected people from the digital industry to be judges – if you want to be a judge see the I want to be a judge section.

For a gold medal, we are looking for groundbreaking app that will transform visitor’s experience next year when they come into the Hackney area during summer 2012. Detailed criteria can be found in the guidance document once you have registered.

IC tomorrow, a Technology Strategy Board programme is managing the competition. They have run many competitions and use an audited process on their _connect platform.
The Technology Strategy Board is a UK Government funded body designed to promote innovation and it is funded by the Department of Business, Innovation and Skills.

With exception to some basic organisation details and a very brief description of your entry, no one except the organisers will see the entrants’ submissions.
If successful, there will be many opportunities to promote your idea and company throughout the competition, we will agree with you in advance any information you wish to make public at this stage.

Entrants will get access to data sets from the website Destination Hackney, due for launch early next year – this will include events feeds from right across the borough and profiles of our local shops, restaurants, bars and museums. We will also curate a set of data feeds from a wide variety of sources including Transport for London and the GLA, and work closely with the IC tomorrow LinkedGov team on identifying further data sets to include. We are also promoting the competition to platform providers such as Google, Foursquare and Facebook.

Yes we will be having a launch event on Wednesday 5th October and further events will be held throughout the contest. Please see www.raceforapps.com for details as they are announced.

UK Trade & Investment (UKTI) and Hackney Council are bringing 20,000 unaccredited journalists and 1,000 of the world’s top business leaders to the purpose-built EXPO centre Hackney House in Shoreditch during the Games in 2012. All visiting journalists and business people will receive a pack containing details of the Race for Apps winner.

Hackney will be putting considerable effort into maximising its Olympic legacy. Practical examples may include having the winning mobile apps on display within the EXPO part of Hackney House and creation of a Hackney “Happstore”.

There will be considerable media coverage around the competition and Hackney in the first six months of next year. You will benefit from being aligned with the official channels /London & Partners.

Around the Olympics you need to be especially careful not to accidently infringe their brand with your app. Please see their guidelines at the link here:
http://www.london2012.com/documents/brand-guidelines/guidelines-for-business-use.pdf

We are not directly production funding the development of apps – rather we are linking people up with mentors and investors to help app ideas become a reality.

You are free to retain as much ownership of your idea as you wish. As part of the pitching and investment cycles, we will be introducing you to investors who may want equity in your app in return for their investment.

In the first instance please let us know at go@raceforapps.com. We will be running a number of investor focussed events during the competition and we will keep you informed.

Yes, we will be running similar sessions to the all-day pitching sessions that took place as part of Tech City Launchpad.