Case Study: Urban Refuge achieves better access to local aid for urban refugees with Microsoft Corporation

Urban Refuge - Customer Case Study

Urban Refuge, a Boston University nonprofit created to help urban refugees find aid through their mobile phones, faced the challenge of replacing unreliable word-of-mouth information with an accessible, accurate digital resource. With support from Microsoft Corporation and services including Azure Active Directory B2C, Azure App Service, SQL Server 2016, Visual Studio App Center, Visual Studio Team Services, and Visual Studio Tools for Xamarin, the team built an Azure-powered mobile locator app for Arabic and English users.

Microsoft Corporation helped implement a cross-platform app with a shared codebase, a management portal for updating aid listings, and tools for beta testing and crash reporting. The solution launched with a database of more than 160 aid organizations and helped enable a successful pilot for an estimated 650,000 Syrian refugees in Jordan, while cutting development time and cost by half or more.

Urban Refuge

Noora Lori

Faculty Director