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It’s December and nearly Christmas! To get you even more into the festive mood, we’ve put together a hand-picked list of our favourite Christmastime-themed apps. You can use them count down to the big day, make some delicious desserts for family and friends, or simply add a dash of winter cheer to your phone. 1. Christmas Time Pro (Free) Want to know how many days, hours, minutes, seconds, and even milliseconds until Christmas? Christmas Time Pro will provide a countdown for next Christmas Day. At midnight on Christmas Eve, the time will freeze while Santa delivers gifts throughout the world. 2. Celebrate Christmas (Free) Christmas is made more enjoyable as this application has it all: Christmas decorations, prayers, carols and locations of churches. You can also try your hand at preparing the Christmas recipes. Chocolate tarts, fluffy white marshmallows and traditional Christmas pudding… need we say more? 3. NORAD Santa (Free) NORAD Tracks Santa App is the official mobile app of the NORAD Tracks Santa program. Watch the day’s countdown to Santa’s flight, follow Santa’s progress, and learn about NORAD and its mission. Each year, NORAD dutifully reports Santa’s location on Dec 24 to millions of children and families across the globe. 4. Rail Rush (Free) This Christmas, step into your cart and begin this exploring frenzy! Accelerate through insanely fast rails while tilting and swiping to avoid the obstacles. You can also equip your cart with power ups to extend your chances inside the mine, while completing missions and ranking up to be the ultimate explorer. 5. Baker Business 2 Christmas Free (Free) Own your very own merry bakery and bake your way to the top by making tons of delicious treats for your customers. You’ll be able to expand your business and customize your bakery; all the while fulfilling your customer’s orders and boosting your bakery’s rating, making you #1 bakery in town. Love any of these Christmas apps? Do tell us what you think in the comments below.

Hi folks, here are the winners for the Windows Phone Challenge #3! Nokia Lumia 1020 Challenges 1. A filter application which allows users to show filter effects in real time while taking picture and add the filter effect after taking a picture. This application should provide the user with 10 interesting filter effects (you are to come up with these effects), and you are encouraged to use the Nokia Imaging SDK for this. The application would provide users In-App-Purchase features to purchase additional interesting filters. You are free to come up with the revenue dynamics of this application, but the app should be 100% free to download from the store. The application should also save a 38MP picture into isolated storage if the detected phone is a Lumia 1020.To maximize your potential of getting revenue from purchases of filters, you should add a gallery of user generated photos with the effects. You should also provide a “trial” to some of these paid filters, example use for 3 times. No Winner. 2. A photography application which can trigger one or more other Windows Phone to take pictures. The intention of this application would be to great a bullet time effect. The master phone should be able to connect or sync up with the slave(s) phones via NFC or other means you deem fit. Once synced, the master phone should be able to trigger the slave(s) phones in a continuous manner. The slave phones should send the pictures taken back to the master phone in chronological order in which the photos are taken. If possible, the delay time between 2 slave phones taking pictures should be less than 10ms. You can considering doing a burst mode of each of the slave phones, and selecting the ones which makes the chronological order. Bullet Time Camera and Action 3. A video diary application similar to the popular iOS and Android application, one second everyday. Here’s the original idea One Second Everyday ; but we would love to have you take it further. While the application strictly follows the calendar, this windows phone version of the application should also allow the user to use it during holiday and during events to take lots of 1 seconds snippets. Do note that you would have to save the videos into isolated storage (when you are travelling, there is no Internet) and then onto an online storage services. The online service would then trim these videos to exactly 1 second each and stitch them together. One Second Diary 4. An optical object regconition app comparable to CamFind. You can find an API for this on mashape. No Winner. Nokia Lumia 1520 Challenges 1. An application to show the dengue hotspots in Singapore. You should make use of Here Maps for this application. This application show make use of Live Tiles to rotate information about the dengue hotspots in Singapore. The application should also users to voice query for hotspots in a region and response with speech. Example users will ask “appname, is bukit panjang a dengue hotspot?”, the application should reply “Yes or no” and show the map of the region. If possible, implement a push notification update which will show the users what are the newest reported dengue hotspots. Here’s a website you can start off with Dengue SG Dengue Hotspot 2. An application to check the timing of SMRT Trains at different stations and provide news of Breakdown. This application should allow user to pin their favorite station(s) as a live tile(s), and this live tile should show the arriving timing of the next train. User may pin more than 1 station live tiles. There should also be a “status watch " live tile which would show the general status of the trains running. If there is any delay or breakdown, this live tile should show the information in text. SG Train Time 3. An application which is similar or comparable to myENV application from NEA No Winner. 4. An application which is similar or comparable to iTown@SG from Town Council MyTown@SG 5. A competitive application similar or comparable to SBS Iris NextBus. The application should allow users launch the application via Speech to query by Buses Number / Bus Stop Number. Example “app name, timing for bus 190” or “app name, bus timing at bus stop 12345”. The application will then launch and ask you for more information (if necessary) before displaying the wait time. The application should also allow you to pin a secondary live tile with the wait time for a specific bus at a specific bus stop. Pressing this live tile will launch the application to give you more information on the bus and its bus route. SingAdventure Nokia Lumia 920 Sudden Death Challenges 1. An application to help create SMS for overseas notification. You have to follow the list of countries available from www.ns.sg for overseas notification. This application should allow the user to use speech to launch the application from the start screen. Example “appname overseas notification to australia from 1st October 2013 to 10th October 2013” will help you to create the SMS template to 36767. “MNC NRIC Country of Visit Departure Date (DD/MM/YYYY) Return Date Contact Number” This application should prompt you for your NRIC and Contact Number on first launch and store it into the isolated storage. NSNotify 2. An application to show the programme schedule for MioTV and Starhub Cable TV SG TV Guide 3. An client application for reading sgag post, Singapore’s version of 9gag. SGAG 4. An client application similar to 4DTOTO@SG, but showing big sweep results for Singapore Speech is optional for this as Big Sweep numbers are really long. :) BigSweep@SG 5. A fan application for Internet Explorer Mascot Inori Aizawa. You are free to use this as a template, please use this Theme Pack link for the “soundboard” section. Do change the background, fonts, wallpapers and videos to suit the theme of IE or Inori Aizawa. Also include the video from Anime Festival Asia Special Video and add the video theme song as a Windows Phone Ringtone. If you need pictures for wallpaper, refer to this skydrive account to select relevant ones. Do ensure that the sounds from the soundboards are savable as SMS and other alert tones on the Windows Phone No Winner Inori Aizawa

AppCampus is a mobile application accelerator program managed by Aalto University in Espoo, Finland. This is an 18 million euro joint investment between Microsoft and Nokia to foster mobile application development on Windows Phone and any other Nokia platform. To drive innovation and business opportunities in Finland’s mobile ecosystem and beyond, Microsoft and Nokia invested 9 million euros each into the “AppCampus” program - a newly established mobile application development program at Aalto University during the next three years starting from spring 2012. The AppCampus program has been set up to foster the creation of innovative mobile applications for the Windows Phone ecosystem, and in addition, Nokia platforms, including Symbian and Series 40, to create a new generation of self-sustaining mobile startups. Kicked off in May 2012, AppCampus is led and managed by Aalto University, which has a growing reputation as a hotbed of new startup companies. AppCampus is intended to attract thousands of application proposals from students and entrepreneurs from all over the world. Successful applicants will receive awards varying from 20.000, 50.000 to 70.000 euros, depending on the complexity of the app. In addition, AppCampus also provides training in mobile technology, design and usability, coaching and marketing support. Windows Phone Marketplace and Nokia Store offer local and global business opportunities to program participants via distribution to consumers around the world. AppCampus doesn’t take any equity or commission from the investment. The only requirement is that successful applications are expected to be available exclusively on Windows Phone Store or Nokia Store for the first 90 days. Got an app idea? Apply today and send in your submission here!

Learn how to maximize traffic to your applications and websites by enhancing your SEO and SEM strategies in this 2-part jump start. Each half is an hour long and offers a variety of different scenarios and demos that will provide you with an introductory overview to search and the role it plays in attracting and winning you new audiences. Part 1 of the module gives an introduction to Search Engine Optimization (SEO), its role in the online world and the ways in which it has been growing. SEO is about improving usability on a website. It is the organic process of improving a website to make it more relevant to searchers and search engines. Some questions that will be answered in the first half include: ...

Big data has been a buzzword of the tech landscape in recent years, with apps being one of the key mediums where the average consumer can make sense of real-time trends and other interesting insights often obscured by big data. [caption id=“attachment_16673” align=“aligncenter” width=“610”] Image from www.visibletechnologies.com[/caption] So here, we have compiled a list of the top 5 free APIs in Singapore to create your next bestselling app! 1. Government: data.gov.sg http://data.gov.sg/common/developer.aspx This is the first-stop portal to search and access publicly-available data published by the Singapore Government. Launched in June 2011, data.gov.sg brings together over 8,600 datasets from 60 government ministries and agencies. Key datasets include: ...

At the recent BizSpark Night for December, we had a fireside chat with James Tan, founder and managing partner of QuestVC, China’s leading seed to angel fund for technology. He disclosed how he started 55tuan (a successful Chinese group buy site) and then, QuestVC. How James started 55tuan and then QuestVC James went to China on a scholarship, meeting his cofounders of 55tuan from Qinghua University. 55tuan is currently one of the largest group buy websites in China. He further explained that it was not easy for them to sustain 55tuan, as China experienced a myriad of Groupon clones over the past couple years, but the majority of them could not keep up with the fast pace of China’s tech industries and went out of business. James later with his partner decided to start on another project called QuestVC, which was a venture capitalist firm based in China. This attracted many e-commerce companies to seek help from QuestVC to get funding and mentoring opportunities. However, James’ stand is that he also hopes to help to all companies in other tech industries. How many startups has QuestVC invested in? James explained that he funds companies at the seed to angel stage. QuestVC invested in 6 companies over 1.5 years and 2 Singapore tech companies, Carousel and Burple. The companies they invested are independently managed and display high potential in the market. Carousel allows consumers to sell their items on their platform and get cash in return while Burple is a localised food app for photo sharing. With the help of QuestVC for seed funding, they are intending to expand their influence to China and also Singapore’s neighboring countries, Indonesia and Malaysia. What suggestion do you have for startups that wish to apply for QuestVC? What do they need to do? James encouraged startups that wish to seek funding from QuestVC to source for strong financial backing first. One of such ways is to seek help from government agencies such as ACE or SPRING Singapore. They provide necessary information, connections and provide financial grants such as series A funding to assist companies to progress. After applying from government agencies, startups can then apply for QuestVC with their working prototype and discuss with James for seed funding and support for expanding overseas. Of course, the team will need to have the ability to articulate the opportunity and how they going to execute their ideas. What is the start-up scene like in Singapore? Are their any suggested programmes to promote entrepreneurship? James pointed out that in Singapore, there are many potential graduates that choose not to be startup entrepreneurs because they feel the need to work in big multinational corporation companies. The vast majority of them are not willing to take up risks with a startup that may or may not succeed. To better foster the entrepreneurship dream of starting a tech company, the NUS Overseas College (NOC) programme collaborated with the highly prestigious Tsinghua University for students to study entrepreneurship and internship full time with companies in Beijing. The programme will play a key role in nurturing entrepreneurs who then can engage with China. James is supportive of the programme and he hopes to see more batches of entrepreneurs coming from Singapore in near future. We hope that BizSpark Night 2013 has provided valuable advice to startup entrepreneurs. We are grateful and want to thank our distinguished speakers for taking time from their busy schedules to contribute to this meaningful event.

For December’s BizSpark Night, we were privileged to have Gary Gan as one of our guest speakers. Gary is the Business Development Director for TradeHero, a mobile stock market stimulation app. TradeHero recently made headlines for raising $10 million in series A funding from KPCB China and IPV Capital, a Chinese-based venture capital firm that invests in early stage high-growth technology firms. He gave us some practical tips to startups starting their first ventures into China. China has obvious potential, with a massive domestic market hungry for tech With a population 1.35 billion strong and over 700 million users with internet access, China is a lucrative market to be tapped. Gary strongly encouraged more tech companies to enter China where the consumption demand for tech - be it mobile, social or web - is massive. This can be demonstrated by the android store exceeding its available 500 applications, which also justifies the intense competition. Many factors fall under the big umbrella of business strategy. However, the main idea is to weigh the costs and benefits. Gary encourages startups to locate their firms near to partners, clients and customers. This enables startups to have easier accessibility to more opportunities and undiscovered markets, save on transport costs and expose themselves to a larger diverse pool of manpower. Startups should travel down personally, preferably with a local team to do an on-site inspection to before launching their new firm there. Be well-versed in local infrastructure and regulations Awareness of the local government regulations and incentives must be at your finger tips. This can really assist or sabotage the company. Government expenditure to boost trade is very generous in China, and there are many incentive schemes cater to new startup films. Examples include the taxation relief system and Wholly Foreign-Owned Enterprise (WFOE). Equity and Cooperative Joint Ventures are also strongly encouraged. Support from the government will mean lesser restrictions and more incentives, which can maximise profits margins for startups. Do your homework, get assistance from industry experts Government agencies such as IE Singapore, Spring Singapore, IDA and NUS Enterprise help startups to boost their overseas marketing presence, branding consultancy and reducing headhunting costs. More often than not, these agencies support the setting up and staffing of marketing offices overseas. They also subsidise third party consultancy costs for branding activities. Therefore, seeking help from these organisations be a great help in help you introduce your first office locally or in China. Link to Gary Gan’s Slides https://www.dropbox.com/s/4rdh9xce3mftrph/BizSpark%20Gary.pptx

Organised by Microsoft BizSpark, this year’s BizSpark Night was held on 28 November at Microsoft Singapore Level 21 Auditorium. Distinguished speakers like Bruce Wang, Gary Gan and James Tan were present to educate startups on introducing their presence into the world’s second largest market, China. China’s tech landscape: An overview Bruce Wang, a senior evangelist in Microsoft Singapore, was the Director for RenRen Inc. at Microsoft China for 6 years from 2005 to 2011. He outlined the difficulties of venturing into China such as cost, location, hiring and promoting of business. Having sufficient financial power and the ability to utilise them to the maximum potential allows startups to survive in the increasingly competitive Chinese landscape. Having abundant capital can allow for a good foundation and an advantageous headstart. Choosing the right location is crucial as it enables startups to source for their skilled laborers. This is especially so for tech companies which are knowledge-intensive industries. Beijing and Shanghai are favorable locations where skilled talents are in abundance. The 1,106 universities allow new firms to find their skilled manpower more easily in these areas. However, opportunity costs must also be measured as absolute costs are higher due to the poaching of scholars among companies. Due to higher costs of living in cities, employees also anticipate a higher salary compared to those in the inner cities like Chengdu and Wuhan. Successful examples of startups Bruce pointed to DouPing and PPTV in Shanghai, and Weibo and RenRen in Beijing, where Bruce happens to be from. Inner cities can also be considered based on the characteristics of the firm - for example, TaoBao, China’s cheapest and largest online marketplace, developed its headquarters in an inner city, Hangzhou, for the pool of cheaper labour. In China, social media censorship is very heavy due to government backing of local portals. Popular social media platforms such as Google, Facebook and YouTube are banned in China. They are substituted by local online portals such as Baidu, RenRen and Youku respectively. Hence, expanding one’s branding overseas can be taxing due to unfamiliarity with these platforms. However, startups can do mobile advertising in China through approaching channels such as AppFlood, Baidu, and Qihoo. Networking and yearly events Annually, tech conferences such as Global Market Internet Conference (GMIC), China Joy and TechEd China bring in prominent speakers from Chinese companies to discuss issues ranging from market entry, mobile trends and internet technologies. International startups will also get to showcase their products to investors and raise funds. Lastly, Bruce also mentioned Microsoft Ventures in China, a startup initiative aligned with the BizSpark programme that can help startups to acquire free tools, cloud computing resources and global routes to market with mentorships and seed opportunities. Startups entrepreneurs that are interested in the programme can email bruce.wang@microsoft.com for more details. Link to Bruce’s PowerPoint slides: http://sdrv.ms/1etWKCX [youtube width=“425” height=“344”]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bQ2qOqXauuw [/youtube]

In this Developer Feature series, Spiffy talks to up-and-coming developers to learn what makes them tick. For December, we have 35-year-old Ben Goh, a software engineer at Autodesk. He created Asher’s Maze for his son’s birthday, a game released exclusively on the Windows 8 and Windows Phone Store that took a year to develop. Describe yourself in three words. Approachable, funny, nonsensical. What motivated you to start building Asher’s Maze? I tried to build many things before: MP3 player, isometric web game, UI skin engine, 3D turn-based game… but none of those got completed. I realized that they didn’t get done because of a very simple reason – I was building them for myself, but I got attracted to different technologies all the time. Obviously having a moving target did not go too well with delivering something. Until a year ago, I found the “right reason” for me to do the next project – my son Asher. ...

Nokia Lumia 525 combines style and entertainment with an accessible smartphone price Stylish Lumia smartphone delivers a rich selection of high end innovations on Windows Phone 8 SINGAPORE – Nokia today introduced the new accessibly-priced Nokia Lumia 525, a variant of the successful Lumia 520, delivering a rich selection of high end innovations and experiences taken from premium Lumia smartphones. Powered by the latest Nokia Lumia Black version of Windows Phone 8 operating system, this fun and colourful smartphone offers many of the same Nokia imaging experiences as its high-end siblings, as well as maps and navigation from HERE, and free music streaming from Nokia MixRadio. A four inch super sensitive touchscreen and 1GB RAM completes the highly immersive smartphone entertainment experience. “The Lumia 520 has been a great success story for our Windows Phone 8 portfolio since its launch earlier this year. The Nokia Lumia 525 will expand our reach, bringing high end Lumia experiences to many more consumers at an affordable price.” said Vlasta Berka, Vice President, Sales & Marketing, Nokia Pan Asia. “With the ability to run the latest apps like Instagram, Vine, and Halo: Spartan Assault, this beautifully designed smarphone is a clear signal that Nokia delivers a better smartphone experience at every price point.” Like any great smartphone, the Lumia 525 includes an outstanding imaging experience, including a fivemegapixel autofocus camera and an advanced imaging applications like Nokia Camera. Nokia Camera features provide imaging controls that make it easy to shoot like a pro, whilst Smart mode lets people create the perfect group picture, even remove unwanted guests from the shot. Cinemagraph brings still images to life, which can then be shared with friends on Facebook, Twitter or via email. The Nokia Lumia 525 also offers the latest version of Nokia MixRadio, providing free, unlimited streaming of music without the need for registration, sign in or listening to ads. The easy to use service lets people build mixes based on favourite artists and download up to four mixes for listening offline, as also offering the new Play Me button that delivers users their own personal radio station with just one click. The Nokia Lumia 525 includes the free suite of HERE applications, including HERE Maps, HERE Drive and HERE Transit which means never getting lost, whilst also saving on data costs. With Windows Phone 8, the Nokia Lumia 525 also provides a more personal smartphone experience allowing people to pin playlists, HERE routes, Web-pages and documents direct to the Start Screen as Live Tiles makes it easier to access favourite content, while People Hub brings all social media notifications and messages into one convenient location. Also included are Xbox gaming, as well as Microsoft Office with Outlook, Word, Excel and PowerPoint available out of the box for free, Windows Phone 8 makes the Nokia Lumia 525 a powerful productivity tool. The Nokia Lumia 525 also allows to store a wealth of content both created and collected with 7GB of free online SkyDrive storage, 8GB mass memory and expandable 64GB memory slot. Available in gloss orange, white, yellow and matte black and with changeable shells, Nokia Lumia 525 will be available in Singapore from 14 December at the suggested retail price of SGD249 at Nokia Stores and Nokia Solution Partners. ...