Masdar

Masdar is advancing the development, commercialisation and deployment of renewable energy and clean technologies – as a link between today’s fossil fuel economy and the energy economy of the future.

The Mubadala Development Company, which is owned by the Abu Dhabi government, established Masdar as a wholly owned subsidiary in 2006. Masdar is guided by The Abu Dhabi Economic Vision 2030, a programme that drives new sources of income for the emirate and strengthens its knowledge-based economic sectors.

Masdar takes a holistic approach to its organisation, with interconnected businesses focusing on Clean Energy Deployment and Sustainable Real Estate. Masdar Institute, an independent, research-driven graduate university, rounds out the organisation.

With each unit focused on a key component of the value chain, Masdar operates with the broad scope needed to meet the most pressing sustainability challenges of tomorrow. This keeps Masdar at the global forefront of the clean energy industry as we pursue pioneering and commercially viable technologies and systems.

Melinda Gates

Along with Bill, she shapes and approves the foundation’s strategies, reviews results, and sets the overall direction of the organization. Together, they meet with grantees and partners to further the foundation’s goal of improving equity in the United States and around the world.

Through her work at the foundation over the last fifteen years, Melinda has seen first-hand that empowering women and girls can bring transformational improvements in the health and prosperity of families, communities and societies. Her efforts have significantly contributed to expanding educational opportunities and access to information technology around the world.

The Arab Thought Foundation

The Arab Thought Foundation is an international independent non-governmental organization. It has no inclination to any party or religious group; it is rather dedicated to promote the Nation’s pride with all its principles, values and ethics, in an atmosphere of a responsible freedom.

ATF deals with different knowledge fields, like science, medicine, economy, business administration, mass media and literature; with a goal to unite intellectual and cultural efforts that seek Arab nations’ solidarity, renaissance and conservation of its values.

The Arab Thought Foundation was instituted in Beirut on May 5, 2000, on the occasion of proclaiming Beirut Arab Culture Capital. During this celebration HRH Prince Khalid Al Faisal called for a solidarity initiative that joins finance and intellectual competencies. This is to be adopted by an Arab non-governmental organization that seeks to promote Arab renaissance and solidarity.

The National Geographic

The National Geographic received half of the prize; half a million US dollars for its prominent role as one of the most important channels for disseminating knowledge in the world. Since its creation in 1997, it managed to dive with man into the deepest oceans, take him for a ride on the surface of the earth and underground. It took him away to discover planets and galaxies, focusing on the most important events in ancient history with historical characters and great events, in an attempt to monitor all that is new in modern technology or in biology.

The award was received by Gary E. Knell, President and CEO of the National Geographic Society.

Hiroshi Ishiguro

Hiroshi Ishiguro received a quarter million US dollars of the value of the knowledge Prize. He is also the author of more than 300 scientific research studies in detection systems and devices, and interactive robots. He has developed many of the robots that have been able to reap international awards.

Hiroshi is Professor of Department of Systems Innovation in the Graduate School of Engineering Science at Osaka University, Distinguished Professor of Osaka University, and visiting Director of Hiroshi Ishiguro Laboratories at the Advanced Telecommunications Research Institute (ATR).

His research interests include distributed sensor systems, interactive robotics, and android science. He has published more than 300 papers in major journals and conferences, he has developed many humanoids and androids. These robots have been reported many times by major media, such as Discovery channel, NHK, and BBC.

He received the best humanoid award four times in RoboCup, in addition to other international awards.

Ahmad Alshugairi

Ahmad Alshugairi received a quarter million US dollars, being one of the most influential and motivating persons for the Arab youth, 12 million following him on Twitter.

Shugairi is a very popular Saudi media personality he Created the idea and presented the Famous Saudi Arabian television program “Khawater” for 11 successful seasons.

He published several books, including “Khawater from Japan” which was about the fifth season of his popular television show.

In recognition of his achievements, he won the Best youth media personality in the third youth media forum in Jordan, and he was placed 143 in a list of 500 of the most influential Arab figures in the Arab world according to a survey published by Arabian Business magazine.

Jimmy Donal Wales

Ranked by Forbes Magazine as a “Web Celeb”, Jimmy Donal Wales is a U.S. Internet entrepreneur, wiki pioneer, and technology visionary, who is best known as the Founder of Wikipedia, an international collaborative free content encyclopedia on the Internet, and the Wikimedia Foundation.

He is co-founder of Wikia, a privately owned free web hosting service he set up in 2004.

Mr. Wales is a Fellow of the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School. He serves on the Board of Directors of Socialtext, a provider of wiki technology to businesses and the non-profit organization Creative Commons. Mr. Wales has received an honorary doctorate from Knox College of Illinois and was presented with a Pioneer Award from the Electronic Frontier Foundation in 2006.

Sir Tim Berners-Lee

Sir Tim Berners-Lee invented the World Wide Web in 1989 while working as a software engineer at CERN, the large particle physics laboratory near Geneva, Switzerland. With many scientists participating in experiments at CERN and returning to their laboratories around the world, these scientists were eager to exchange data and results but had difficulties doing so. Tim understood this need, and understood the unrealized potential of millions of computers connected together through the Internet.

A graduate of Oxford University, Tim teaches at Massachusetts Institute of Technology as a 3Com Founders Professor of Engineering and in a joint appointment in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at CSAIL. He is a professor in the Electronics and Computer

Science Department at the University of Southampton, UK, Director of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), and author of “Weaving the Web” and many other publications.