Irish students took home the big prize at Microsoft's programming competition Imagine Cup with car software that monitors dangerous driving and alerts the driver and car owner.

Team Hermes won the $25,000 Software Design prize at the Imagine Cup finals, held in New York. The students wrote software to reduce driving deaths. The winning program used technology on Windows Phone, the Azure cloud platform and Bing Maps.

"We have a problem in Ireland; that problem is deaths on our roads," said team member James McNamara in a statement. "Thanks to Microsoft and the Imagine Cup, we've been able to come together to solve this problem and save lives."

Microsoft puts on the annual competition to encourage student excitement around software. The company flew 400 college students from 70 countries to this year's final round, which began Friday, when Microsoft Chief Executive Steve Ballmer spoke to the group.

Microsoft gave awards in several categories Wednesday, including Windows Phone and game design. Students took home a total of $215,000 in prize money.

Here is a full list of the Imagine Cup winners.

Here is our earlier story about the Imagine Cup. It highlighted more projects from other teams.

Next year's Imagine Cup finals will be held in Australia.

(Photo of Team Hermes: Microsoft)