Informatics PhD student wins innovation award
A PhD student who has created a medical app to help patients and their carers keep a track of medication has won a £20,000 prize for innovation.
Fares Alaboud, a PhD student in Artificial Intelligence, won the inaugural Soyoye Technology Innovation Prize to help him develop his venture, The Medic App, which uses Artificial Intelligence to make medication scheduling easier and to update the patient's carers.
The prize, founded by King’s alumnus Babatunde Soyoye, Co-founder and Managing Director of Helios Investment Partners, supports the brightest tech talent from King’s and is awarded to a student, staff or alumnus on the Entrepreneurship Institute’s King’s20 accelerator programme.
Fares was one of two selected from 5 finalists who pitched to an expert panel made up of Babatunde Soyoye, Ed Wray, the serial entrepreneur and angel investor, Steven Hayes, Managing Director at Beckhoff Automation Ltd, Julie Devonshire, Director of Entrepreneurship Institute, King’s College London, and Arthur Zargaryan, President of KCL Robotics Society.
Fares and David Wexley, who has invented a portable wearable technology that uses pressure and movement to enable wearers to create music, were chosen for the quality of their innovations, their passion and capacity to succeed as entrepreneurs, and the impact the prize money would have on reaching their potential.
Speaking about the win, Fares said: “I am over the moon to have won. My professors and the Entrepreneurship Institute have given me such support and the prize money means we can go even further. It’s a very exciting time for AI and for The Medic App.”
David said: “Being able to turn my passion for music into a business and share it with others is a dream come true. The money will help us refine our prototype and develop new sounds. We’ve come a long way in the short time the team have been together and we want to be the best in this market and explore its potential.”
Professor Luca Viganò, Head of the Department of Informatics, said: “I am delighted that Fares Alaboud has been awarded this prize, which will enable him to continue his venture. Students here at the Department of Informatics are encouraged to develop innovative and ground-breaking research across AI, computer science, robotics, telecommunications and electrical/electronic engineering, and Fares is one of several shining examples of this. Many congratulations to him.”