Professor Amy Rutledge and visiting professor Jerry DeHondt presented the Google Glass App Development contest to around 40 students on Monday.

The contest is designed for teams of between one and four Oakland University students to conceive and develop a business strategy and code for a brand new app for the Google Glass.

The contest is broken into two parts – the business side and the development side.  The School of Business Administration will be awarding prizes to the teams with the best ideas.

By March 7, the teams are expected to submit their business plans for a chance to win $500.

The top five groups, as selected by a team of judges, will then move ahead with their ideas and actually create the application, which is due on March 31.

They will present their completed product to a panel that will announce a winner on April 18.  The team with the best app will be awarded $2500 and the runner up will receive $1000.

“Google itself isn’t involved,” Rutledge said.  “But we are trying to bring a representative from the Google Glass team onto the panel as a judge.”

The Google Glass is a wearable piece of technology that resembles a pair of glasses with a single prism where apps are displayed.

The current version of the product is second generation. Only around 10,000 people own a Google Glass and availability of applications is limited.

“There’s not a whole lot to them right now,” Rutledge said.  “They’re really fun, but they’re really new.”

Professor Rutledge teaches Management Information Systems in the school of business.  She sees this contest as a chance for students to use their creativity in two different areas of the tech industry.

“I thought it would be fun to bring this business and programming opportunity to Oakland,” she said.

This contest is unique to OU.

“I think we’re the first,” Rutledge said.  “I’ve really searched to see if anyone else has done something like this, but I think we’re it.”

Any OU student is eligible to compete and teams are encouraged to be balanced between computer science majors and business students.

“Professor Rutledge is my MIS professor,” freshman finance major Mujaab Muhammad said.  “I found out about the competition through her class.  I figured I’d check it out, I have a few ideas.”

Contact staff reporter Adam Kujawski at [email protected]