‘Poised for profound impact on world’: Apple CEO Tim Cook on India's Asmi Jain

Jain, who is from Indore, became a first-time winner of the 2023 edition of the iPhone maker's annual Swift Student Challenge.

India's Asmi Jain is ‘poised to make a profound impact on the world', according to Apple CEO Tim Cook, who held a video call with the Indore resident, a first-time winner of the 2023 edition of the iPhone maker's annual Swift Student Challenge.

Asmi Jain in conversation with Tim Cook (Image courtesy: Indian Express)

“At Apple, our mission is to help people everywhere pursue their passions and bring their best ideas to life. I had an amazing time meeting so many people from India's innovative iOS developer community earlier this year,” Cook said after the virtual interaction, according to Indian Express. He was referring to his visit to the country in April, when he inaugurated the tech giant's first 2 exclusive retails outlets in India, in Mumbai and Delhi respectively.

Speaking about Jain, meanwhile, he continued: “Asmi's incredible work exemplifies the creativity and ingenuity on display all across this country. She is already poised to make a profound impact on the world by helping people with their health, and we are excited to see what she does next.”

What did Asmi Jain develop?

She developed an app to track a person's eye movements, even as they try to follow a ball moving around the screen. She entered the competiton after a friend's uncle was left with eye misalignment and facial paralysis in the wake of a brain surgery.

A student at the Medi-Caps University in her hometown – also the nation's cleanest city – Jain, hopes her creation can be used for various eye conditions and injuries.

“My next goal is to get feedback and make sure it’s effective and user-friendly, and then release it on the App Store. Ultimately, I want to expand it so that it helps strengthen all of the muscles in the face,” she told Apple in an earlier interview.

Apple's Swift Student Challenge

Each year, Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) is preceded by the Swift Student Challenge, under which the company challenges students across the globe to create an original app playground using the Swift coding language. In 2023, the competition had 375 winners (including first-timers); Apple increased the number from 350 in previous years, doing so to recognise more youngsters for their artistry and ingenuity.

The WWDC 2023 took place from June 5-9.