Orange Egypt, the official sponsor of iRead initiative, continues its sponsorship of one of the major cultural initiatives and events in the Arab world that aims to motivate young talents, writers, and promising authors and talents to fulfil their dreams while reviving reading in the Arab world, which comes as part of Orange’s corporate social responsibility programmes whereas culture, education and development are one of the main pillars that comes under its strategy.
The event was held at the Cairo Opera House’s Grand Theater in the presence of Orange Egypt’s management, a diverse group of writers, talents, publishing house leaders, cultural icons, and public figures.
Orange has started sponsoring iRead initiative since its inception in 2019 within the company’s commitment to promoting Egypt’s artistic and cultural scenes while supporting programs that foster the discovery and development of artistic and creative talents.
iRead this year featured almost 10,000 powerful voices, 1,000 short stories, 100 writers and novelists, and numerous additional special activities. Moreover, this year’s iRead Awards recognized the winners of 4 competitions, which included the Best Emerging Literary Work, in which the top three winners were honored, in addition to the Short Story Competition, in which 20 short stories were chosen and published collectively, and the Readers’ Reviews Competition, in which the best review and the best 3 written reviews of Naguib Mahfouz’s literary works were honored; and finally, the best book, best writer, and best cover competition, in which the best book, best writer, and best cover were determined by audience.
On this occasion, Maha Nagy, Orange Egypt’s Chief Communications Officer, stated, “Orange Egypt has been always keen to support the young artistic and creative talents and support them in fulfilling their dreams and inspire others while representing Egypt around the world”. Maha highlighted that this was one of the reason behind supporting the initiative since its inception.
Engy Al-Sabban, iRead Foundation’s Board of Directors member, stated that the 2nd iRead Awards ceremony demonstrated that we have excellent literary skills said that “Our primary objective with this competition is to recognise such talents and provide them with an opportunity to launch their literary careers”.
“As digital technology has become embedded in our daily lives, we were determined to enhance cultural awareness and encourage young people to read on a daily basis through iRead platform, which features the largest collection of Arab books and authors,” Al-Sabban continued.
