Call for Code Creator David Clark Cause, in partnership with Founding Partner IBM (NYSE:IBM), United Nations Human Rights and the Linux Foundation, today launched the 2022 Call for Code Global Challenge, the largest and most ambitious effort bringing together developers and problem solvers to use open innovation to help accelerate sustainability and combat climate change.
Now in its fifth year, Call for Code galvanized a community of more than a half million developers, students, and problem solvers from 180 nations who answered the call to use advanced technologies to design cutting-edge open source-powered hybrid cloud and AI solutions that can tackle the world’s most pressing societal issues.
The 2022 Call for Code Global Challenge opens today, and solutions can be submitted any time before the deadline of October 31, 2022. The Grand Prize winner will receive $200,000 and solution implementation support from IBM Ecosystem partners.
Call for Code participants can identify the sustainability issue they want to solve, form a team, and start building by registering on the new Global Challenge resource site hosted by BeMyApp. Once registered, participants will be able to attend Challenge Accelerator events to help fast-track their projects, learn from subject matter experts, access exclusive skills-building materials, and use exclusive toolkits, APIs, and data sets from The Weather Company and participating IBM Ecosystem partners.
Call for Code has also been selected as the preferred innovation platform of the Right Here, Right Now Global Climate Alliance, one of the largest public/private climate partnerships in the world. The alliance and its global partner United Nations Human Rights are working to empower solutions and reframe climate change as a human rights crisis due to its disproportionate impact on women, people of color, and impoverished and marginalized communities. With a fast-growing alliance of policy-makers, NGOs, foundations, corporations, academics, scientists, and developers, Right Here, Right Now Global Climate Alliance and United Nations Human Rights are supported by celebrities including Leonardo DiCaprio, Quincy Jones, Ellen DeGeneres, Camila Cabello, Cher, Pitbull, LL Cool J, Cyndi Lauper, Jason Mraz, and Billie Porter, among others.
"On behalf of Call for Code, we're honored to be selected as the preferred innovation platform for the Right Here, Right Now Global Climate Alliance," said David Clark, CEO of David Clark Cause, and Creator of Call for Code. "As the Global Challenge opens today, we're excited to utilize our expansive platform to help people in need by calling on developers worldwide to innovate software that can mitigate and reverse the effects of climate change through sustainable solutions." “From rising sea levels, extreme weather events, wildfires and droughts, to food insecurity, health impacts, mass migrations, and increasing global conflict, there is no denying that climate change is a humanitarian crisis. With its global reach and history of success over the years, we’re excited to work with Call for Code, as it has proven to be the gold standard when it comes to engaging developers around the world to innovate for social good,” said Bill Stark, Chief Impact Officer, Right Here, Right Now Global Climate Alliance.
2022 Call for Code Global Challenge Open for Submissions
Call for Code, IBM, and IBM Ecosystem partners Arrow Electronics (NYSE:ARW), EY, Ingram Micro, Intuit (NASDAQ:INTU), New Relic (NYSE:NEWR), and Persistent Systems, are providing participants with access to technical resources and subject matter experts during themed accelerator sessions, which can help them pinpoint problems to solve. Applications can be built using open source-powered software including Red Hat OpenShift, IBM Cloud, IBM Watson, IBM LinuxOne Community Cloud from IBM zSystems and IBM Blockchain, as well as APIs from IBM’s The Weather Company.
"We have a long and trusted partnership of 19+ years with IBM and we share a common vision to create solutions that help address some of the world's most important social challenges," said Sandeep Kalra, CEO and Executive Director, Persistent Systems. "We are eager to help address some of the many sustainability challenges through Call for Code with IBM and the developer community, employing open source-powered hybrid cloud and AI solutions that can scale."
"Technology is the catalyst for scaling solutions to global problems – from climate change to humanitarian issues, and even the global pandemic," said Ruth Davis, director, Call for Code, IBM. "IBM along with Call for Code and these ecosystem partners are dedicated to taking on the complex challenge of sustainability and encourage problem solvers around the world to take part." Teams of developers and problem solvers are asked to innovate solutions that address the diverse challenges aligned to sustainability and the impacts of climate change. For example, solutions can include new ways to improve sustainable production, consumption, and management of resources, reduce pollution creation, and protect biodiversity to create a greener future, among others. Solutions may also address areas such as: how to improve the ability to measure, analyze, or take decisive action on carbon emissions; refine supply chain transparency and traceability to bring fast and accurate visibility to sustainability issues where they arise; reduce volume of and demand for materials that create the biggest waste footprint; and encourage reuse/recycle opportunities.
University students will have the opportunity to win the University Prize, a program created in partnership between IBM and Clinton Global Initiative University. In 2021, more than 90,000 students across hundreds of universities around the world, surpassed the program goal by nine times.
2021 Call for Code Global Challenge winner, Saaf water, a team of India-based university students, recently completed a successful test of its accessible water quality sensor and analytics platform at a housing complex in Goa, India. The test helped Saaf water analyze the building’s water quality and they were able to update their installation process for future tests.