The IT Machine Behind the 2012 Arctic Winter Games
March 13, 2012
by Joel Witten
Every visitor to this web site www.awg2012.org can learn an infinite amount about the 2012 Arctic Winter Games.
All the information anyone ever wanted to know about these games is housed in a system called GEMS Pro. GEMS stands for Games and Event Management Systems and is the brainchild of Greenland based Kimik IT.
Like the Arctic Winter Games themselves, Kimik IT is an international cooperative effort, with twenty-five employees divided between offices in Nuuk, Greenland and Aarhus, Denmark.
I was introduced to Kimik IT CEO Ian Wennerfeldt by the 2012 AWG Vice President of Information Technology (IT) Don Pumphrey. A Vice President at Northwestel, Pumphrey proudly told me of the significant communication technology requirements met during these games. In support of the games, 53 wireless networks were deployed across 19 buildings. 390 2-way radios and over 60 computers were put to the test.
Northwestel planned for and supported the over one million cell phone calls that were made during the course of the games, including the staggering 140,000 calls that were made from the Canada Games Center in one day alone.
Pumphrey told me “The IT team had a fantastic time during the games. It was a great bunch of volunteers and I was proud to be a part of the team.”
A big part of this effort was the robust and diverse GEMS Pro application. It was this hidden gem that allowed web site visitors to easily learn about medal winners, sport locations, and games schedules. The same system also housed all the information used to register both participants and volunteers. Everything housed in GEMS Pro is hosted across the world in Denmark.
With over a decade of experience building systems for games in Canada, Wennerfeldt noted that the web site engine used for the 2012 AWG is, “a system is built on knowledge we have learned from other games.”
Like Northwestel, with its countless 2012 AWG volunteers, Kimik IT also has a dedicated team supporting these games. So much so that when Kimik IT’s Palle Thygesen fell down the stairs during the games and broke his wrist, the first thing he did before checking his broken bones was to make sure that his laptop was still intact!
Northwestel and Kimik IT both delivered gold Ulu performances in the IT competition.