Hackathons #3

Summary of Hackathon#3

EU for Innovation Online Hackathon#3: How to help Albanian businesses with new affordable digital solutions? Tirana, May 26, 2020

University teams, start-ups and innovators virtually come together to create solutions for the real-life needs of Albanian SMEs.  Small and Medium Enterprises.

On May 25^th, the 3^rdHackathon in a series organized by EU for Innovation in partnership with Crazytown/Finland, ICTSLab and OFICINA/Albania aiming at finding digital solutions for the Albanian businesses kick started.  In this innovation event,referred to as a “Hackathon”, 15  teams of enthusiastic university students & staff members, start-ups & innovators, supported by over 20 mentors / experts, will “virtually” come together for 48 hrs using the latest video technology and online collaboration platforms,  to create solutions for the real-life needs of Albanian Small and Medium Enterprises.

For this Hackathon, the Albanian Commercial Union, Albanian Manufacturers’ Union, Young Entrepreneurs of Albania Union, and Albanian Microfinance Association members represented by Kredo Finance and NOA financial institution have shared concrete needs and challenges of their members and associated SME around the topic of digitalization. Based on the identified needs of the Albanian SMEs the participating teams developed solutions for the following three concrete challenges:

Challenge 1: How to help businesses to better understand and make use of e-commerce / omnichannel solutions?

Challenge 2: How to improve HR workflows, processes and transparency with affordable digital solutions?

Challenge 3: How to make use of real-time data and technologies for better decision-making and cooperation?

At the kick-off event, aiming at orienting the participating teams, helping them find the focus and start the work on their solutions, the challenge owners were asked to further elaborate on the challenges presented by them.

During the following two days, on May 26^thand 27^th, the participating teams were guided through the hackathon, by two facilitators from CrazyTown, Finland (Toni Pienonen and Mikko Korpela). Joint meetings referred to as “checkpoints” were conducted on certain intervals, while in between the competitors were coached by the mentors, some of whom have academic background and others business experience.

On May 27^th, after the submissions of the pitches, the jury composed of challenge owners, mentors, ecosystem players, etc met virtually to view the pitches and jointly discuss on teams. The jury members will evaluate the solutions based on the following criteria: Novelty, Impact and Actionability, and provide with the final verdict on Friday morning, May 29^thand Winners will be announced during a final live show on fb channels, at 19.00.

All hackathon participants and everyone interested is invited to join!

What will be some of the prizes awarded to the winners, by the EU for Innovation project?

• Participation in the EU for Innovation Bootcamp 6/2020 (an acceleration camp with support from high level trainers and mentors to develop the best projects/ideas of the EU4Innovation Hackathon series further)
• 1 person from each winning team is invited to join a trip to European startup conference (e.g. Websummit, Piratesummit, Slush)
• 2 months of free coworking at Innospace in Tirana
• Participation in the “Matchmaking and Exposure Programme” of EU for Innovation, 2 weeks of internship in Germany
• Participation in an incubator or accelerator programme in Albania
• Continued follow-up support by EU for Innovation

Hackathon #3 Winners:

TOP 3 Teams that will receive awards & support from EU for Innovation 

ThreeSixty: Epoka University team

ThreeSixtyis a service company which offers B2B and B2C solutions utilizing online e-shopping platform including 360 degrees view on products offered by SMEs.

Amela Rahimi – 3^rdyear Business Informatics student

Belinda Myteberi – 3^rdyear Business Informatics student

Lisbora Likaj – 3^rdyear Business Informatics student

Sildi Mustafa – 2^ndyear Business Informatics student

Nertil Zhuri – Epoka Alumni, Senio Tech Lead at Cardo AL

Igli Hakrama – Mentor and lecturer at Epoka University

Sapientify: Start-up team

Sapientity is an affordable and customized platform for online language courses.

Aleksandra Ngjeliu – Co-founder and creator

Arber Nushi – Marketing strategy developer

Klaus Veliu – Web developer

Kleis Metani – IT expert

Click and Forget –Faculty of Economics/ University of Tirana team

Click & Forget is the salary specialist.

Meghi Bisholla – student at the Faculty of Natural Sciences

Shahin Dokuzi -IT Expert/ student

Soana Jaupllari – Assoc. Prof. at the Faculty of Economics

2 teams part of the top5 that will receive 2 training vouchers from ICTSmedia:

• one voucher in Python Programming
• one voucher for Digital Marketing (Social Media Management)

Uni-Polis Team

“getUr’s”: on-line employment platform

A multidisciplinary team from the fields of IT, architecture and industrial design:

Albina Tocilla, Gregor Andoni, Tielma Karabina, Besnik Peca, Arber Ibra

Eterna-Team: Faculty of Economic at University of Tirana & Logos University

An HR & workflow platform that tackles “compliance issues” and increases business process operation

Team: Gjergji Mulla, Elibert Sulce, Xhulio Sulce, Dimitri Mile, Patrick Kola, Hristo Raca

More information on the hackathon could be found on:

www.hackathon.al/; www.euforinnovation.al/hackathons/