Toronto,
14
March
2019
|
12:00
Europe/Amsterdam

Visionary Women in Technology Across the Globe Recognized by Booking.com at 2019 Technology Playmaker Awards

Toronto – March 14, 2019 – Booking.com, one of the world’s largest e-commerce companies and a digital technology leader, has announced the recipients of the 2019 Technology Playmaker Awards. Now in its second year, the awards recognize women across the global technology scene who are trailblazing new paths, creating innovative products and experiences, positively impacting communities and inspiring future generations. At a gala ceremony held in London, UK, last night, eight prizes were awarded, including seven individual category awards, one employer award, and the overall 2019 Technology Playmaker of the Year award. Two Canadian women, Jeanette Stock of Venture Out (Toronto) and Jodi Kovitz of Move the Dial (Toronto) were finalists in the Community Impact and Role Model categories respectively.

The winners include a Mexican entrepreneur who has created a detection system to locate survivors following an earthquake; the founder of an NGO aiming to lift Nigerian girls and women out of poverty through technology education and empowering teachers as change agents; the creator of a device that allows women to test for cervical cancer at home; and the leader of a global movement to teach girls coding, AI and robotics. Each category winner received a prize of over $7500, and the Technology Playmaker of the Year, who was selected from among the individual winners, received an additional $15,000. The seven categories recognized the tech contributions of women in areas ranging from positive business impact, innovative use of digital tools and emerging technologies, community impact and sustainable practices, rising tech talent, and an organization that is demonstrating a commitment to achieving gender diversity in IT and technology.

Linda Liukas, Finland-based founder of Rails Girls, was named the 2019 Booking.com Technology Playmaker of the Year. This award is given to the individual category winner who judges felt has made the most impactful contribution to innovation in technology and driven social change at a global level. In addition to founding Rails Girls, a global movement that is teaching young women to program in over 300 cities worldwide, Linda is the author and illustrator of Hello Ruby, a children’s picture book series translated into 25 languages about the world of computer science.

The 2019 Booking.com Technology Playmaker Award winners are:

  • Community Impact – Martha Omoekpen Alade (Nigeria), founder of Women in Technology in Nigeria (WITIN), an NGO using technology to drive socio-economic empowerment in Nigeria in order to help 20,000 women and girls out of poverty by 2022
  • Role Model – Linda Liukas (Finland), founder of Rails Girls
  • Business Leader – Beena Ammanath (US), Global VP of AI, Data & Innovation at HPE and Founder and CEO of Humans for AI, a non-profit focused on increasing diversity in tech through the use of artificial intelligence
  • Young Technologist – Betelhem Dessie (Ethiopia), founder and CEO of Anyone Can Code (ACC) in collaboration with iCog Labs, empowering children and young adults to innovate via coding, AI and robotics with the aim to solve society’s problems through technology
  • Tech Innovator – Sophie Hombert (France), founder of Aglaé, the first luminescent plant company of its kind, developing a biodegradable nutritive serum that gives plantsa luminescent effect
  • Digital Leader – Jill Zeret Jiménez Rodríguez (Mexico), founder of Zytreon Tecnología Infinita, a technology firm that launched a detection system to locate survivors following an earthquake
  • Employer Award1 Million Women to Tech (US), a global online technology education program dedicated to reaching one million women with free coding education by January 2020.

“We received an exceptionally high caliber of nominations from every corner of the world, and it is my pleasure to congratulate all of our inspiring finalists and winners. Their stories highlight the breadth and scale of achievements that women at all stages of their tech careers are making every day,” said Gillian Tans, CEO at Booking.com. “We recognize the need to shine a light on role models in the tech industry, and set out to create a forum that brings together leading female technologists from different backgrounds to exchange ideas and perspectives and build connections with the aim to inspire future generations and achieve equal gender representation for women in tech.”

This year, the awards were open to global nominations, building on a European focus last year, and drew hundreds of entries from over 60 countries.

The awards ceremony and gala dinner on March 13th included speeches from Eileen Burbidge MBE and partner at venture capitalist firm Passion Capital, and Hadeel Ayoub, CEO of BrightSign, an assistive technology start-up that created a smart glove to help non-verbal people to communicate. Hadeel was recognized as the inaugural 2018 Technology Playmaker of the Year.

The judging panel was chaired by Gillian Tans and included leaders from global tech companies, academia and start-ups including Skyscanner, WeTransfer, Amazon Web Services, Spelman College, Delft University of Technology, NeuralBay, Wormhole and All Turtles, as well as representatives from the European Parliament and the Financial Times.

For more information about the winners, please visit: http://techplaymakerawards.com/this-years-winners

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About Booking.com

Established in 1996 in Amsterdam, Booking.com B.V. has grown from a small Dutch start-up to one of the largest travel e-commerce companies in the world. Part of Booking Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ: BKNG), Booking.com now employs more than 18,000 employees in 200+ offices in 70 countries worldwide.

With a mission to empower people to experience the world, Booking.com invests in digital technology that helps take the friction out of travel. At Booking.com, we connect travelers with the world’s largest selection of incredible places to stay, including everything from apartments, vacation homes, and family-run B&Bs to 5-star luxury resorts, tree houses and even igloos. The Booking.com website and mobile apps are available in 43 languages, offer over 28 million total reported listings, including more than 5.7 million listings of homes, apartments and other unique places to stay, and covers more than 147,000 destinations in 229 countries and territories worldwide.

Each day, more than 1.5 million room nights are reserved on our platform. So whether traveling for business or leisure, customers can instantly book their ideal place to stay quickly and easily with Booking.com, without booking fees and backed up by our promise to price match. Via our customer experience team, customers can reach Booking.com 24/7 for assistance and support in over 43 languages, any time of the day or night.

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About Technology Playmaker Awards

For all details on the winners, categories, entry criteria, judging process and awards related information please visit the http://techplaymakerawards.com/ website.