Intel's App Innovation Contest 2013 (AIC 2013) has just launched in Russia, China, India and the US. Five hundred finalists will receive either a Lenovo All-In-One or a Tablet device and the top nine winners will share $100,000.

For this contest, which is sponsored by Lenovo, Intel has partnered with:

•  Code Project (US)
•  Habrahabr (Russia)
•  ThinkDigit (India)
•  CSDN (China)

You can enter the contest through one of these partners according to the language you prefer to use and it isn't restricted to the four territories mentioned.

Code Project for example will accept entries from:

Australia, Belarus, Belgium, Canada (not including Quebec), Germany, India, Indonesia, Israel, Japan, Kenya, Nigeria, People’s Republic of China, Republic of South Africa, Russia, South Korea, Spain, Taiwan, UK, Ukraine, and the 50 United States of America (and the District of Columbia) .

commenting:

Yes, it's a shame we can't open it to everyone because of various laws in different countries, but we had to make a call on whether it's better to offer it to many (but not all) of you or none at all.

The competition has three stages. In Round 1 you need to register and submit an Windows 8 app idea by September 4 to be judged by the four regional partners.

The selected finalists, 125 from each partner, will then be sent a Lenovo ThinkPad Tablet 2 or a Lenovo Horizon 27" All-In-One and will have from September 18 until October 30 to code, test, tweak, debug, to polish their Round 2 demos for submission to the judging panel of Intel and industry experts.

The top five demos in each of the contest's six categories will then be invited to submit 5-minute videos (in English) that clearly present the features and innovative uses of the demo app with the submission period being November 13-20.

There are two categories for the All-In-One, Entertainment and Games; and four for the Tablet, Education, Finance, Healthcare and Retail.

There are six Category Prizes of $10,000 in cash and two Platform Grand Prizes of $10,00 and an Overall Grand Prize of $20,000. In addition there are promotional prizes for the winning apps and $5,000 worth of prizes for Spot Challenges throughout the contest.

So if you have an idea for a Windows 8 app this may be the best way yet to monetize it!