Hey Everyone, I’m Avanti!
'Dream Big, Accomplish Bigger'
Avanti stands for the sustainable development goals, clean energy, and aims to make the world a better place for future generations. Avanti wants to encourage more young girls and women to code in order to bridge the gender gap in education.
Avanti is Pre-teen Technology Specialist at Workshop4Me, since January 2017. She is interested in the capability of Science and Technology, and likes to share the joy of coding with children. She spends her after-school hours participating in coding competitions, addressing conferences, running workshops, doing yoga, and being with family and friends.
Avanti launched Codeutainment on February 8, 2019 – a revolutionary concept, the first of its kind in the world, where Coding, Science, and Mathematics are presented in an entertaining manner in a movie hall to simulate the experience of watching a thrilling movie.
Avanti is also WeSTEM+ Brand Ambassador and Head of Business Development Workshop4Me.
Instagram: @avanti_workshop4me
Awards and recognition
- Won 3rd place in POST Luxembourg's Financial Inclusion hackathon by Luxembourg Tech School (LTS). Received award by Minister of Finance, Gilles Roth, July 7 2024
- Won the Luxair AI hackathon by Luxembourg Tech School (LTS), April 21 2024
- Named 'Top 100 Speakers' 2023 by Women In Tech, December 5 2023
- Represented Europe as a finalist for the Women In Tech Global Awards under the 'Aspiring Teen' category. The event took place at the Sharjah Research Technology and Innovation Center, UAE with the support of the Excellencies Prince and Princess of the UAE, November 16 2023
- Won the Women In Tech Europe Awards with the 'Aspiring Teen Award'. The event took place under the High Patronage of Emmanuel Macaron, and was hosted at Hôtel Potocki the seat of Chamber of Commerce and Industry of the Paris-Île-de-France Region, October 11 2023
- Won the 'honorable prize', the only prize awarded to International Delegates, and a sum of 500€ at the Largest Science Exhibition in Portugal representing Luxembourg with her project Studified™ . Avanti presented her project under the 'Engineering Technology' category. June 3 2023
- Won the opportunity of presenting her project Studified™ at the National Science Exhibition Portugal 2023, as a young scientist in Jonk Fuerscher 2023
- Invited to Esch 2022 Mars Exposition as a 'young scientist', published in Phase 1 № 23, October 8 2022
- Named 'Top Fifty Women in Belgian Tech' by InspiringFifty, October 6, 2022
- Selected as a Finalist for the WomenInTech Europe Awards, September 20 2022
- Representative of ShEU LEADS, initiative by European Commission, Mariya Gabriel, May 31 2022
- Selected as Finalist for the Aspiring Teen award at Women in Tech, 2020
- Won ICT Rising Star special award at the IT Ladies Night on December 17, 2019
- Won ‘Coup de Coeur’ and 3rd place award for the Game of Code hackathon as part of Team Coder Dojo Girls on 8-9 March, 2019
- Selected to represent European School Kirchberg Luxembourg for the European School Science Symposium at Mol, Belgium March 31st – April 3, 2019, for ‘Smart Cap’ project
- Nominated as Women in Tech International Awards as Most Promising Junior, for which Avanti was invited to Lisbon during WebSummit November 2018 and addressed the audience at the commencement of the Awards ceremony.
- Was selected as semi-finalist in Technovation Challenge 2018 worldwide mobile app development contest. Avanti’s Team ACAD2018 built an app MyEco about the environment and was selected among the 100 semi-finalists out of 2000 apps.
- In March 2018, had been nominated for the Technology Playmaker award 'Rising Star of the Year' category. Avanti was invited to the inaugural ceremony at the Museum of London hosted on International Women's Day with a gala dinner with 100 women leaders in technology. Avanti was felicitated by Gilian Tans, President and CEO Booking.com. Randi Zuckerberg, CEO of Zuckerberg Media mentioned Avanti in her speech and spent time talking about a possible collaboration in her DOT Complicated project aimed towards encouraging teenage girls to take up coding. Soon after, she invited Avanti on her Business Radio show Dot Complicated. Recording: Radio Recap.
- Efforts were formally recognised by KPMG after Avanti co-hosted a 5-day session for EUCodeWeek at KPMG Luxembourg, October 2018 and introduced 70 KPMG employees to HTML and CSS along with my brother, Atreyam (Leo). Also, conducted coding workshop for KPMG Employee kids.
- In April 2017, along with the Luxembourg team, Avanti participated in the Technovation Challenge. The team coded a mobile app One-Click Safety App and also wrote a business plan for it.
Speaker at technology, education, and entrepreneurship conferences:
- Master of Ceremony at the House of Startups Garden Party 2024. Invited Minister of Finance, Gilles Roth to the stage, October 3 2024
- Presented the Aspiring Teen Award at the Women in Tech Europe Awards 2024, held in Chateau Sainte-Anne, Brussels. Honored by Ayumi Moore Aoki, who gave such a gracious introduction going back to 2018 at the Women in Tech Global Awards Lisbon. Ayumi decorated Avanti with her own Women in Tech lapel pin and played birthday music when inviting to the stage, October 1 2024
- Delivered address at the Women in Tech Luxembourg launch event, September 12 2024
- Presented at the UBS Women & Allies event, July 1 2024
- Master of Ceremony on the Main Stage during Nexus2050. Had the privilege of inviting H.R.H. the Crown Prince, Minister Gilles Roth, Minister Lex Delles, Commissioner Illiana Ivanova, and others on stage. Co-hosted the opening ceremony with Sophia the robot, by Hanson Robotics. Master of Ceremony during the Closing Seated Dinner where Sophia the robot was assembled on stage, the first-time in history, June 26-27 2024
- Interviewed Maurice Lévy on a fireside chat on the main stage at Nexus2050, June 27 2024
- Interviewed Alexandre Mars on a fireside chat on the main stage at Nexus2050, June 27 2024
- Keynote address at the MyConnectivity side event during Nexus2050 on "Intergalactic Communication", June 26 2024
- Keynote address at Nexus2050 on "How the SDGs can learn from the journey of Technology - Luxembourg Edition" on the Main Stage at Nexus2050, June 26 2024
- Keynote address at the Joy of Coding conference Rotterdam, speaker's invite-only event, June 21 2024
- Presented "My dream" at the inauguration of the Women in Tech Global Summit 2024. Panelist on the youth panel, May 5-7 2024
- Panelist at PwC Luxembourg's International Women's Day event, in collaboration with AMCHAM Luxembourg and BakerMcKenzie. Shared views alongside Marjolijne Droogleever Fortuyn, Head of Legal Affairs at BNP Paribas, Analia Clouet, Secretary General at Banque Raiffeisen and Ian Fish, Upper School Principal at International School of Luxembourg moderated by Mary Carey, Editorial Lead at PwC Luxembourg, March 8 2024
- First-ever and only speaker from Luxembourg at Mobile World Congress (MWC) Barcelona. Panelist in "How can we Empowever the Vulnerable in a Digital Environment?" moderated by Jacky Wright, CTO and Senior Partner at McKinsey. Moderator in "Never Too Young to Lead" Panel with Gil Rosen CMO of Amdocs, Biju Nair EVP of Assurant's Global Connected Living Business Unit, and Anne-Flore Agard VP and Head of T&M Europe at Capgemini, February 26-28 2024
- Master of Ceremony at Deloitte Disrupt GenAI Conference, held at Luxembourg House of Startups, LHoFT, December 7 2023
- Speaker at Women Economic Forum held in Wembley, London, on the SDG Panel and Power of Language Panel. Received two awards in the event, "Young Innovators Creating a Better World for All" and "Exceptional Woman of Excellence", October 30 2023
- Delivered Closing Keynote at Codemotion Milan, on the topic of "How the SDGs can learn from the journey of technology", October 25 2023
- Panelist at Girls in Tech Luxembourg x Workshop4Me AI For Families event as part of Meet and Code, October 7 2023
- Master of Ceremony at TN'Teens, March 30, 2023
- Presented her project Studified™ at Jonk Fuerscheur, March 18, 2023
- Presented her vision at ETGBS, youngest speaker on the Circular Economy Panel, on February 18, 2023
- Delivered Keynote Speech as Brand Ambassador of GirlsInTech Luxembourg at Launch event, on June 21, 2022
- Delivered Keynote Speech at Deloitte Belgium ESTEAM Fest,
- Master of the ceremony at the TN Teens event on Mar 31, 2022
- Youngest speaker on the panel at European Commission's Digital Education Stakeholder Forum, on March 22, 2022
- Addressed the International Women's Day Summit, by LOGY Talks, on Mar 8, 2022, and presented challenges and solutions for getting more girls in tech
- Selected as a young scientist to address Esch-2022 Mars conference and presented 'Setting up VR + AR centers to prepare for travel to Mars and living there' on Dec 13, 2021
- Addressed Deloitte's Horizon conference, on 28th September 2021 as the youngest keynote speaker on Technology, Innovation, and Sustainability
- Addressed ICT Spring conference on Sep 14th, 2021 as youngest keynote speaker. She spoke about "How an iGen will implement the sustainable development goals"
- Addressed Economic Times Women in Tech conference on Feb 24th 2021 as youngest keynote speaker. She spoke about "Girl Power: What it means to be a girl in tech"
- Addressed Women Tech Global Conference 10-12 June 2020 as youngest speaker. She spoke about "How the virus is changing our perception of technology"
- Addressed Women in Tech Global Virtual Tour on the Youth panel as the youngest speaker on 28 May 2020. She shared her coding journey and role as Youth Ambassador at Women in Tech
- Addressed EU Robotics Forum: panel on women in robotics, 3-5 March 2020 as youngest speaker in Malaga Spain. She was also interviewed and invited to present the awards
- Addressed TEDxHUBerlin: How an iGen would implement UN's Sustainable Development Goals, on Feb 22, 2020 as the youngest speaker
- Addressed Fireside : Challenging STEM Education Models at EdTechX Europe on Jun 18, 2019 as the youngest ever speaker. Shared her thoughts on how the education system needs to be able to cater to the iGens
- Addressed Disrupt X Session at Global Business Summit on Feb 22, 2019 in New Delhi as the youngest ever speaker. Shared her thoughts on the changes which are needed to make technology more accessible to bring about social change especially empowering girls in Coding and STEM skills.
- Addressed the Diversity Summit at KPMG, 20 September 2018, where Avanti’s co-Panellists were highly accomplished professionals, entrepreneurs and politicians from all over Europe, including the former and the lady Dy. Prime Minister of Luxembourg. Video here
- Spoke at Campus Italia technology conference in Milan in July 2018 on the subject of making technology more accessible to children.
- Delivered the special address at the awards dinner the Wonder Woman in Tech conference in London on June 15, 2018 during London Tech Week, photos of the event.
- Was in the panel at the Women and Girls in Science conference in London on 10-11 Feb 2018 at Microsoft Accelerator, together with women leaders in technology.
- Along with my brother, Atreyam (Leo), delivered pre-teen and teen view through our story at the Hub Dot 5th Anniversary event in London on Feb 9, 2018.
- Delivered a talk on the subject of Entrepreneurship at Hub Dot event in Luxembourg on Nov 17, 2017 hosted by Ernst & Young.
- Addressed the Scratch Conference in Budapest, Hungary in August 2017 in the presence of the founder-cum-MIT Prof. Mitchel Resnick at Learning Research cell at the MIT Media Lab, where Mitchel leads the Lifelong Kindergarten research group. Available online: Photos of the event, my talk and the Scratch conference video
Prominent Media Coverage
- Featured in Top 100 under 40 in Paperjam's #NextGen edition. This edition was printed and mailed to every mailbox in Luxembourg.
- Paperjam #NextGen video interview, August 19 2024
- Featured in Lëtzebuerger Journal article - La relève IT se prépare, August 14 2024
- Paperjam « What's Next ? » interview, June 28 2024
- RTL TV during Nexus2050, June 26 2024
- Forbes Portugal Article, written by Ana Catarina Piexto interview during Women In Tech Porto Summit, June 13 2024
- Interview by David Savage on Tech Talks after meeting at the Women in Tech Global Summit 2024, May 15 2024
- Interview article by Mobile World Live about R-U-SURE and Studified™, May 14 2024
- Portrait in Paperjam's 'Unusual Suspects' edition, photographed by Guy Wolff and interviewed by Pierre Théobald, May 1 2024
- Article about MWC 2024 on Luxembourg Government Website with Elisabeth Margue, Minister of Connectivity, February 27 2024
- Interview about MWC Barcelona 2024 published on Digital Innovation Luxembourg a branch of the Gouvernement de Luxembourg, Februrary 2024
- Article on My Connectivity Luxembourg about MWC 2024 with links to both the panel discussions Avanti took part in, Feburary 2024
- PwC Luxembourg Article about panelist at International Women's Day event, March 8 2024
- Techsense Article about DisruptAI Conference, December 2023
- Silicon Luxembourg Article about winning the Women In Tech Europe Awards under the 'Aspiring Teen Category'.
- Graffiti Interview at Radio Ara about her project Studified™ and upcoming participation in the Luxembourg International Science Expo (LISE) 2023
- Luxembourg Wort Article about her 'honorable award' representing Luxembourg at the National Science Exhibition Portugal with her project Studified™
- L'essentiel Article about her 'honorable award' representing Luxembourg at the National Science Exhibition Portugal with her project Studified™
- Chronicle Article about her 'honorable award' representing Luxembourg at the National Science Exhibition Portugal
- Special mention from Sousana Eang, Director of Fondation Jeunes Scientifiques Luxembourg
- Special mention from Fondation Jeunes Scientifiques Luxembourg
- « Dans le téléphone de Avanti Sharma » Interview at Orange Luxembourg
- Podcast at the Europe Code week about the importance of starting to code early on, Feb 1, 2022
- Podcast on Coder's mindset for Unbinary Life, December 20, 2021
- Interviewed at EU Code week Kick off event on Oct 7th, 2021
- Gave an interview for Italian magazine after being youngest speaker at Campus Italia technology conference in Milan in July 2018 on the subject of making technology more accessible to children.
- Maker Magazine of December 2018
- Journal.lu French newspaper of 27th November 2018
- Le’ essential of 24th March 2019
- Randi Zuckerberg, CEO of Zuckerberg Media interviewed me on a Business Radio show Dot Complicated aimed towards encouraging teenage girls to take up coding Recording: Radio Recap. 2018
- Nash Squared Podcast, April 18th 2018
Special Coding events
- Ran the Lëtz Get More Girls in Digital Workshop by the European Commission x Workshop4Me where Minister Yuriko Backes and Minister Elisabeth Margue inaugurated the event, after Anne Calteux mentioned Avanti as a role model for young girls. Minister Yuriko Backes mentioned Avanti in her address. Avanti interacted with Minister Elisabeth Margue, June 25 2024
- Ran an SDG Hackathon Workshop at Orange Luxembourg Headquarters, and interacted with the CEO of Orange Luxembourg, Corinne Lozé, October 19 2023
- Ran AI For Families event as part of Meet and Code event with Girls in Tech Luxembourg in collaboration with Workshop4Me, October 7, 2023
- Ran a 2-day workshop introducing AI (Artificial Intelligence) to teenagers at Digital Learning Hub (DLH), April 5 & 6 2023
- Ran a workshop at TN'Teens about building a Snapchat-like filter project using AI and Face Recognition, March 30, 2023
- Lead a workshop at the European Investment Bank (EIB) for International Women's Month, March 21, 2023
- Ran and coached an AI Snapchat-filter-like workshop at Researchers' Days 2022, November 27, 2022
- Mentored 2 teams for the eSTEAM challenge, June 25 & 26 2022
- Won 3rd Place at Luxembourg Youth Robotics Competition (LYRC) as part of Team Ro-bert CodeClub, June 25 & 26 2022
- Facilitated coding workshop during D'Yep Shoulfoire, May 5 2022
- Ran all-girls workshop for Deloitte Belgium as a part of ESTEAM Fest in European School Brussels IV, May 20 2022
- Was youngest Coach facilitating the Moonhack event of Code Club Australia to create world record, as part of Code Club Luxembourg on May 30, 2020.
- Facilitated coding workshop during Makerfest in June 2018 in Luxembourg and was featured in the summary video.
- During the Women and Girls in Science conference in London on 10-11 Feb 2018 at Microsoft Accelerator, I ran a Creative Computing workshop to inspire young girls to code.
- Hour of Code event at Microsoft Luxembourg aimed for 6-13 year old children, in December 2017.
- In October 2017 during EU Code Week, Avanti ran a mobile app development session specifically aimed at young girls to inspire them to try coding. Another event, Avanti ran was Creative Computing workshop for 5-9 year olds.
- Coding session on Scratch Jr for the LuxKids Lab Flight Academy visit and coding event in June 2017.
- Introduction to Scratch session for pre-teens during the weekend Scratch Day celebrations in Luxembourg, in May 2017.
- In January 2017, Avanti ran a paper based introduction to coding workshop, graph paper programming for the 6-8 year old Beavers and their siblings.