Media

Top HKU Students to Battle Brains in Regional IT Programming Contest

03 Aug 2008

 

Mr Charles Mok (Ex-officio member, Hong Kong Information Technology Federation), Hon. Sin Chung Kai (Legislative Councillor) (1st and 2nd from left) and Mr Samson Tam (Spokesperson, Hong Kong IT Alliance) (1st on right) jointly presented the prize to the HKU champion team. The outstanding team members are (from 3rd from the left) Mr Bryan Hui, Mr Eddie Ng and Mr Yip Lik-Yau.

Top students of Computer Science and Actuarial Science of The University of Hong Kong (HKU) are to contest in regional computer programming contest within months, in an attempt to snatch the ticket for entering the global battle. The winning teams of the 16 regional contests would proceed to the international collegiate battle of brains, fighting for the world championship in 2009.

The HKU team "far" (comprising Mr Eddie Ng, Mr Bryan Hui and Mr Yip Lik-Yau) emerged the champion out of 22 teams at the Collegiate Programming Contest (CPC) held earlier in Hong Kong. They solved 4 problems out of 6 in 457 minutes, 195 minutes faster than the first runner-up, the Chinese University of Hong Kong.

The championship have gained the "far" members a travel award of $40,000 for attending the next tier of regional contest.

Another HKU team "Hi Hi" (comprising Mr Chan Sze-Hang, Mr Lai Yiu-Ming and Mr Wong Lai-Yin) won the second runner-up place, having solved 3 problems in 477 minutes.

The CPC 2008 in Hong Kong was co-organized by the Association for Computing Machinery - Hong Kong Chapter (ACM-HK) and the Department of Computer Science, City University of Hong Kong (CityU).

ACM is the world's oldest and largest educational and scientific computing society. Established in 1947, it now has over 80,000 members in more than 100 countries. The ACM International CPC started in 1977, as an innovative initiative to challenge the top students in computer science. The contest has rapidly evolved into a multi-tier competition with a global network of universities hosting regional competitions.

ACM-HK is founded in 1988 by HKU's Chair Professor of Computer Science　and Taikoo Professor of Engineering Francis Chin. The HK Contest has been conducted as an annual collegiate master event since 1991.

The team members of "far" said they were thrilled for being able to regain the championship this year.

"Our classmates have helped in drilling us for months, so as to prepare us for a strike-back", said Mr Eddie Ng.

HKU was the champion in 2006. Yet, the two HKU teams ended up in the first and second runner-ups in 2007, losing to their CityU peers.

"The financial support from the Department of Computer Science has also enable us to gain more experience by entering various local and non-local programming competitions," added Mr Ng.

For media enquiries, please contact:-
- Ms Denise Wong, External Relations Office, HKU (Tel: 2859 2600 / E-mail: denise.wong@hku.hk); or
- Dr Ho Wai-Shing, Department of Computer Science, HKU (Tel: 2857 8457 / E-mail: wsho@cs.hku.hk)