Johan Farid Khairuddin presents ASTRO All Asia Networks plc, a Southeast Asia’s leading cross-media operator specializing in creation, aggregation and distribution of content across multiple platforms. It is the Official Media Partner and Broadcaster for this year’s Global Youth Forum organized by GAID and the United Nations. Forum Alternative Channel on April 30, 2008.

2. BACKGROUND We at Astro are proud to have been the Official Media Partner and Broadcaster for this year’s Global Youth Forum organized by GAID and the United Nations. Astro believes that in order to promote the welfare and well‐being of youth around the world, through ICT, we have to provide more than just a few ideas to talk about – we have to actually physically provide youth with solid platforms to communicate and valid reasons why they should truly be agents of change. ICTs excite the young people because it allows them to network and express themselves instantly, without censorship, seamlessly across borders. With this, for youths to truly act as agents of change, we the private sector & civil society, especially the various ICT centric networks & businesses, should continuously explore ways on helping guide these young tech‐savvy geniuses towards a more positive & mutually rewarding system. At Astro, we have begun to explore such a system – we called this pilot project, THE ASTRO TECHNOLOGENIUS campaign 2007.

3. We began this campaign by commencing a fully integrated media hunt across India, Malaysia and Indonesia for the nation’s brightest and most talented youths. Our core objective was to find new exciting ICT-driven ideas, thought up by the youths themselves, which could potentially better our lives and the lives of our global community. We at ASTRO then helped the selected youths to develop their ideas together by producing videos for broadcast and help them build working prototypes. We also then presented these ideas exclusively on ASTRO TV in ASIA. ASTRO TECHNOLOGENIUS 2007…

4. After receiving hundreds of ideas and team applications for this ICT idea‐bank campaign, we not only found what we were looking for but also, have at the very least, spurred more interest amongst the youths of Asia to be more creatively focused on the development of ICT. This particular positive & mutually rewarding system between the private sector & civil society was a) beneficial to us at ASTRO as we now have a bunch of new ideas which could potentially go towards the betterment of society and b) the ASTRO Technologeniuses, the youths themselves, who came up with winning ideas would get all credit due to them and win themselves an all expense paid trip to beautiful Geneva, to act Agents of Change from their respective countries & communities on a truly global scale. As we made certain that the ASTRO TECHNOLOGENIUS campaign cum contest was opened to include and encourage the orphans, underprivileged, special children and handicapped to participate – we began to also seamlessly connect youths from different communities, cultural backgrounds, income classes, races etc – without prejudice, towards a cause which is the betterment of our global society through the power of ICT. … ASTRO TECHNOLOGENIUS 2007

5. The ASTRO Technologenius campaign is also in support of the Key Thrust 2 of our 9th Malaysia plan which is the Development of Youth. Our initiatives are also in line with Malaysia’s vision to become a Knowledge‐based economy by catering to the ICT industry. DID YOU KNOW?

6. Stage 1 The Selection Process

7. 1 2 3 4 H M’sia India Indo’n Web or Newspaper Colleges / Universities Handicap Astro Judging Panel Of Experts General Public Top 10 Short-listed Ideas Press Conference ( Road Shows ) (Participants send in their best ICT idea)

8. Stage 2 Producing the “Big Idea”

10. Stage 3 Finals – Ground Event

11. Astro Technologenius Fest (September 11 th 2007) The top ideas and also the finalists from Malaysia, India & Indonesia presented their ideas to the public. Video conferencing were done for those that cannot attend the festival. Sponsors & companies were also given a space to promote their brand, also showoff their latest gadgets or technology! Finalists 3 Countries Judges Votes Winners Announced Press Conference 5 winning ideas for each country

12. Final Stage Geneva.. There they went! “ Young ASTRO Technologeniuses rocked Geneva for the first time!!”

13. ‘ Genius is eternal patience’ - Michelangelo, Italian Artist (1475 – 1564) Presentation by Hunsa Thanomsing, General Manager, Youth Dynamics. Edited by Johan F. Khairuddin.