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C5 Announces the Winners of Its Inaugural Shield in the Cloud CompetitionC5, the investment specialist firm focused on cyber security, cloud computing and artificial intelligence, has announced the winners of its inaugural Shield in the Cloud competition. The challenge, supported by Amazon Web Services (AWS), PeaceTech Lab, and SAP NS2, was created to bring together the best and brightest minds working in anti-corruption technology. The winners were announced at the Shield in the Cloud Awards gala, held at C5's PeaceTech Accelerator. General Keith Alexander, founder of the United States Cyber Command, former Commander of the US National Security Agency (News - Alert) (NSA) and current Chief Executive Officer of IronNet Cybersecurity gave the keynote speech. The General spoke about the work being done by the NSA to combat corruption, both at home in the US, and internationally. Andre Pienaar, Founder of C5 Capital, and Kurt Scherer of Booz Allen Hamilton (News - Alert) also spoke at the event. The speakers awarded prizes in three categories: Dream Big, Not for Profit and Government. The winners were: 1. Dream Big - Donor: Mark Labs 2. Dream Big - Local Community: MyndGenie 3. Dream Big - Global Trade: Pole Star - PurleTRAC 4. Not for Profit: Ushahidi 5. Government: Transparency International Ukraine - ProZorro.Sale The Special Operations Division (SOD) of the US Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) and Citibank also received special recognition awards. The DEA were recognised for building an innovative model to combat the linkage between corruption, narcotics and terrorist finance, and Citibank for their support of global technology innovation through their Tech4Integrity programme. Andre Pienaar, Founder, C5, said, "Shield in the Cloud is the first global innovation challenge to combat corruption and terrorist financing worldwide. The public cloud provides unprecedented opportunity to innovate, scale and strengthen good governance, everywhere. We were delighted to see the scale and pace of innovation in so many innovative applicants in the challenge. We were honoured to meet so many leaders and entrepreneurs who are determined to fight organised crime, terrorist finance and corruption to protect their countries and communities, often against the odds." Georgina Callander, Director, Cloud Leadership Centre, said, "There has been an incredible and uplifting number of applicants and discussions that have come out of the challenge. It's clear that the issues that have been raised during our roundtables and interviews with key technology leaders and government officials are front-of-mind for all. This first competition has been a great success and we look forward to continuing to work in this field-not just with the winners-but with some of the high level companies that have also participated in the Challenge." A total of 61 organisations connected with the challenge. A panel of expert judges then created a shortlist of 24 before selecting the winners. These judges included Patrick Garver, formerly Executive Vice President and General Counsel for Barrick; Andy Powell, Head of Product Management, Eduserv; Moira Andrews, Director, Praetor Consultants; Andre Pienaar, Founder, C5 and; Kurt Scherer, Director, Booz Allen Innovation Center. The full shortlist can be seen here. Prize winners will receive AWS cloud credits and the option of taking a place at C5's PeaceTech Accelerator in Washington D.C. to further develop their products under the guidance of C5, AWS, SAP (News - Alert) NS2 and PeaceTech Lab mentors. Photos of the event are available on request, along with full profiles of each winning company. --ENDS-- About C5 C5 Capital Limited ("C5") is a family capital-backed technology investment firm focused on innovating security. C5 is a specialist investor in private businesses in technology, global security and data sectors, and niche sectors such as cyber security, biometrics, detection, and communications companies based in Europe. C5 Capital Limited is a venture capital firm specialising in providing growth and equity capital. The investment team is led by experienced executives who are known for their performance, resilience, agility, discretion and integrity. Their work is enhanced by a unique network of strategic partners known for their leadership in the fields of technology, industry, geopolitics, academia and government. C5 builds long-term partnerships with committed investors who share a passion for creating value by investing in security, innovative founder teams who want to grow their businesses to their full potential and global companies who want to maintain an edge with innovation. C5 tailors its investment approach to the unique needs of each situation, and we are comfortable investing across the life cycle of our target sectors. C5 Cyber Partners is a specialist investment team dedicated to private equity investment in EMEA-based cyber security companies and venture capital investment in data analytics companies. C5 Cloud Partners is an investment vehicle focused on cloud computing-focused companies in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. C5 Accelerate has developed a Cloud Accelerator Cluster in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa alongside Amazon Web Services (News - Alert). Its mission is to accelerate best-of-breed startups throughout EMEA to meet the growth opportunity being created by the geographic expansion of AWS, the world's leading cloud computing platform. Headquartered in London, C5 also has offices in Washington D.C., Bahrain Luxembourg. For more information on C5 Capital, please visit: www.c5capital.com For more information on C5 Accelerate, please visit: www.c5accelerate.com / Twitter (News - Alert): @c5accelerate / Instagram: c5.accelerate
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