Young minds on the run for Sierra Atlantic's 12-hour marathon

"This is the first time that we are holding such a coding challenge and we plan to make it an annual event," Sanjay Khendry, vice-president (business development) of Sierra Atlantic, said.

The pre-qualifier test will be held at Muffakkam Jah College where students will be asked to attempt a one-hour written test at the end of which 30 three-member teams will be selected to take part in the Programmers' Marathon.

"It will be a marathon for the students as the coding challenge that will test the students programming skills will stretch into 12 hours," Khendry said. 

"The best part is that students will be competing in a live environment as they will have to perform as a team. Moreover,  it is not necessary that they will be teamed with the people whom they know," he added.

"We are basically doing this so that potential software professionals understand the importance of software skills and realise where they are falling short. This will help them to prepare themselves for the future. Besides, it will help us in our corporate branding strategy also," Khendry said.

For the twelve-hour marathon, each team will be given a personal computer that is preloaded with languages like Java, C and C++. The marathon will be held at the company's new premises on December 22, 2004, where each team will be given a single problem that the members will have to solve using designing and coding skills, Khendry said.

The winning teams will be given rewards that include a first prize of Rs 30,000 and second prize of Rs 20,000. "Rewards are, however, not the only benefits that will arise out of this marathon for students," Khendry said.

Sierra Atlantic is not putting off recruitment as one of the likely benefits. "We are not assuring the participants of a job with Sierra, but it is something that we may look at also," Khendry said.

"Technical skills are not the only requirement for a job, soft skills are also important. Therefore, it will be difficult for us to assure the participants or the winners of a job," he added.

As part of its CampusDrive program, Sierra has been involved with the academia via curriculum designing, guest lectures and internships. Programmers' Marathon as Khendry puts it, " is one of our attempts to meet our social responsibity by enabling a student-industry interface."