Hack The Crisis: Bulgarian Entrepreneurs Organize An Online Hackathon In Search Of Solutions Against COVID-19 And Its Consequences
Have an idea or just want to contribute to the development of solutions in the current crisis situation, haven’t planned anything for the upcoming weekend? The entrepreneurial network Power of BG organizes a 48-hours long online hackathon for people with business, IT and social backgrounds from across the country who want to work on innovative ideas.
“In Bulgaria, we have seen many examples of entrepreneurs who decided to support the society and made unconditional donations to hospitals and people in need. Our goal is to go one step further and find innovative solutions to the financial and social crisis that is yet to come,” explains Todor Gigilev, the initiator of Power of BG and an IT entrepreneur himself.
Hack the Crisis features three general areas in which solutions will be prototyped: saving lives, saving communities and saving businesses. Everyone can register for the hackathon and submit their own idea or choose to participate in one of the projects that are already listed on the website. Registrations are already open on the initiative’s website. The hackathon itself starts on Friday 27th of March at 18:00 EET and will be held online through messaging platform Slack and video conference call tool Zoom.
Some of the first ideas and how to join the community
Since the start of the registrations, over ten ideas have already been submitted. Some of them are quite concrete, others rather wide defined. One of the participants, for instance, is on the lookout for a software developer to create a map with all small businesses across the country so that consumers can easily find goods produced in Bulgaria. Team “Home office with Kids” suggests the development of a platform that helps parents manage their time at home with kids while working based on the age and characteristics of their children. A new digital process that allows employees to generate ideas and work on innovative projects remotely is also among the proposals.
Participants can register until the start of the hackathon on Friday. Already formed teams can also join as such, and at least one of the members needs to be registered. Everyone willing to be part of the discussion before the hackathon itself can also join the Slack workspace of Hack the Crisis.
Mentorship and financial support
The teams of two to six people will have two days to develop their idea. The first drafts should be submitted by midnight on Friday, and the mentorship sessions will be held on Saturday. The list of mentors is long and includes well-known names from the entrepreneurial ecosystem like Tunio Zafer from pCloud, Svetlin Nakov from SoftUni, Presian Karakostov from PhoneArena and PubGalaxy, Andrey Bachvrov from Bica Services, and others.
The deadline for projects’ submission is the 29th of March, 12:00 EET, and up to 15 selected teams will have the chance to pitch their ideas live at 14:00. Later on Sunday, the jury, including Darin Madzharov from Ucha.se, Mihaela Savova from Leader Talks, Sasha Bezuhnova from The Bulgarian Center of Women in Technology and Move.bg, will select the winners of each category (life, community, and business) and they will share an award of 15K BGN, donated by partners and sponsors.
After the hackathon, the network of Power BG aims to continue supporting the teams ready to bring their prototypes to the next level.
Trending Topics will also support the initiative as media partners and will report on the most interesting ideas.
