On December 8, we hosted the primary Empower & Join Summit at Cisco’s campus in Raleigh, NC, bringing collectively companions, innovators, and communities to discover how expertise can drive significant social affect.
On the middle of that power was the Group Innovation Problem. In partnership with Internet Impression we invited college students from world wide to pitch their boldest concepts: how would they use Cisco expertise to deal with essential challenges in their very own communities? We acquired 84 proposals from 12 nations, with the highest 5 groups advancing to current in individual on the Summit. There, a panel of consultants evaluated their concepts based mostly on their understanding of neighborhood wants, modern use of expertise, and potential for real-world outcomes.
What struck me most wasn’t simply the technical sophistication of their proposals — it was how deeply these college students understood the communities they have been designing for, and the way they positioned expertise as a path to alternative.
Daring options, large affect: Meet the 2025 Innovation Problem Winners
First place: DinéLink – $10,000
Mahima Subramaniyan and Devangna Jadeja, Arizona State College
Spanning 27,000 sq. miles of rugged terrain throughout Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah, the Navajo Nation is the biggest reservation in america. But for practically two-thirds of the greater than 160,000 individuals who stay there, dependable web stays out of attain. [1]
Mahima and Devangna’s proposal tackled this head-on with a imaginative and prescient for digital sovereignty by way of DinéLink, a community-owned community designed to face up to the terrain and serve the individuals who stay there. They proposed utilizing Cisco Extremely-Dependable Wi-fi Backhaul to bypass geographic limitations and attain areas the place fiber isn’t viable, paired with Meraki entry factors and safety home equipment to offer each connectivity and community administration at scale. Photo voltaic-powered hubs would guarantee reliability in distant areas, whereas Catalyst infrastructure would cut back dependency on conventional fiber networks. However what set DinéLink aside was the emphasis on constructing for the long-term by proposing to embed Cisco Networking Academy coaching by way of Diné Faculty and Navajo Technical College, so the neighborhood doesn’t simply get connectivity, but in addition the workforce to take care of and broaden it themselves.
Second place: HealthHorizons – $5,000
Priya Rao (College of Connecticut), Julia Kuang (Wellesley Faculty), Grace Chen (Swarthmore Faculty)
In Greene County, Alabama, simply three practising physicians serve the whole inhabitants. Like many distant areas, sparse infrastructure means restricted broadband entry, placing telehealth out of attain for many residents.
The HealthHorizons workforce’s proposal centered on creating dependable telehealth infrastructure the place none at the moment exists. They designed a system utilizing Meraki infrastructure with failover connectivity to make sure clinics keep on-line, mixed with Meraki firewalls to take care of HIPAA-compliant safety for affected person knowledge. Webex would allow distant consultations and join sufferers straight with specialists, whereas AI-powered instruments may assist with triage. Their four-stage mannequin was designed not as a one-time repair, however as a system that might present continuity of care in a spot that’s been medically remoted for many years.
Third place: OncoALERT – $2,500
Dr. Jayanti Kumari and Sweta Pandey, Translational Well being Science and Expertise Institute (India)
In rural India, most cancers is usually identified too late to deal with successfully. By way of OncoALERT, Dr. Kumari and Sweta proposed a low-cost, AI-enabled saliva biosensor that may very well be deployed by neighborhood well being staff or used at residence — no specialised tools required. The technical infrastructure would use Catalyst wi-fi entry factors to offer dependable connectivity in rural villages, Meraki SD-WAN to increase healthcare networks past city facilities and layered safety by way of Cisco ISE and Duo to guard delicate well being knowledge. Webex would allow distant consultations, bringing oncologists into communities the place they’ve by no means had entry earlier than. If carried out at scale, their mannequin estimates that OncoALERT may display 5 million individuals and probably save 120,000 lives.
Honorable mentions that raised the bar
Two extra finalist groups demonstrated a formidable command of each expertise and neighborhood dynamics:
Cisco Group Join Detroit — $1,000
A College of Michigan workforce proposed a youth-focused digital expertise program designed to certify 1,000 Detroit college students and scale back town’s digital literacy hole by 25%. Their mannequin mixed Meraki infrastructure with hands-on Cisco Networking Academy coaching to construct each technical expertise and profession pathways.
FloodSense Ghana — $1,000
A Talladega Faculty workforce designed an early-warning system to assist communities in Ghana put together for floods earlier than they hit. Their proposal mixed IoT sensors and Meraki dashboards for real-time monitoring with telecommunications partnerships to achieve an estimated 500,000 residents, whereas constructing a pipeline to coach 500 college students yearly in IoT, cloud computing, and analytics.
What comes subsequent: Investing within the subsequent era of drawback solvers
Watching these college students take into consideration expertise the way in which we should always all be excited about it — as a car for fixing actual issues in actual communities — was inspiring. They began the place it issues most: with individuals. Households with out web. Sufferers with out entry to healthcare suppliers. Communities with out flood warnings. Then, they proposed tech-enabled options round these particular wants. Now, every of the 5 finalist groups shall be paired with a senior mentor at Cisco to assist them additional refine their concepts and proceed growing as problem-solving innovators who put individuals and communities first.
That is the sort of pondering that creates actual change. These college students perceive that expertise’s worth lies in making communities more healthy, safer, extra linked, and extra resilient. And that is what Cisco is dedicated to supporting: equipping the perfect and brightest minds of the following era with the assets, mentorship, and expertise they should carry their daring concepts to life.
