Four Otago Polytechnic students behind a smartphone app that can monitor and control temperature in high-end fish tanks have received recognition in a national competition run by software giant Microsoft.
The group picked up $3000 for its second place in the innovation category of the Microsoft Imagine Cup New Zealand held in Auckland at the weekend.
The group's project manager, third-year IT student Carl Crawford, said they were ''very excited'' to get recognition for the hard work they put into the app over the last year.
Mr Crawford said the app, called ''AquaFORCE'', allowed users to monitor and control fish tanks from anywhere in the world.
''The application connects to the aquarium controller, monitoring temperature levels and allowing for adjustments to be made to the environmental conditions,'' he said.
Otago Polytechnic School of Information Technology professor Samuel Mann believed the app could be a commercial success internationally.
''This really does give a lot of functionality to [owners of high-end fish tanks].''
Teams from across New Zealand entered 549 proposals.
The other AquaFORCE team members are Fiorenzo Rutschmann, Daniel Hampton and David Jackson.
