Hack4Vilnius – let’s create innovations for Vilnius city

On 20-22 September, Hack4Vilnius – the second hackathon of Vilnius city – will take place at the Saulėtekis Campus. The aim of this hackathon is to find new solutions and create innovations for Vilnius to become smarter, healthier, more active and cleaner city. Participants will be able to propose their own ideas or tackle one of nearly 40 challenges named by the organizers and partners of the hackathon. Hopefully, the participants will find new and viable solutions to problems that the city faces.

“We want Vilnius to be a huge playground for inventors, data analysts, start-ups and simply for the authors of good ideas, and we are focused on implementing it. We have already demonstrated that the city is ready to open all its data and provide all necessary tools for this purpose. We invite you to come and create. Vilnius is the best place to test your initial ideas or complex solutions,” says Remigijus Šimašius, the Mayor of Vilnius.

An entrepreneur from Israel among the mentors

The first Hack4Vilnius event, which took place in 2018, was very popular as over 100 software developers, designers, business developers and students of various study areas participated in the hackathon. Then, 20 mentors, experienced professionals from Startup.lt, Cognizant Technology Solutions Lithuania, Trafi, Žabolienė ir partneriai METIDA, Susisiekimo paslaugos and other organisations , were working with participants to help them to develop their ideas and prepare for the final competition.

This yearserial entrepreneur Yosef Shavit, an enthusiastic innovation-ecosystem promoter and an innovation scouter, will join the team of mentors. He is the founder and CEO of a tech accelerator Inno-Negev and a business consultancy company Yozma Consulting as well as director of the Bengis Centre for Entrepreneurship and Innovation. During the event, Yosef Shavit will provide personal counselling on topics related to entrepreneurship, innovations and technologies. Moreover, he will lead pitching training and will share his experience on how to present your idea correctly and how to attract the attention of investors.

Hack4Vilnius – trampoline for making your ideas a reality

The organisers of Hack4Vilnius expect this event to become an annual tradition and strive to ensure that ideas proposed during the event are developed further. Team Reality Check is the biggest success of the last year’s event. During the event, this team developed a prototype of an application GetPet. The application is similar to Tinder, but is designed to choose and make an informed decision about adopting a pet from an animal shelter. Representatives of the team Reality Check remember the hackathon and say: “Diversity of the team was the key to our success. Marketing professionals, designers and other persons who focused on development of an idea worked closely with software developers.” Thus, the hackathon is not only for software developers; other professionals who want to expand their network and implement their ideas are also very welcome to participate.

GetPet was massively supported by Lithuanian society and received international media recognition. The Washington Post, The New York Times, MailOnline and other platforms have covered the new product and the team. This year GetPet started cooperation with Vilnius municipality company Grinda.

Teams will compete for valuable prizes

This year the list of prizes is much more generous than last year. In addition to financial awards, the teams can win possibility to develop their ideas further in business incubators, expand their knowledge and look for partners in Israel. The main prize of 1 500 EUR is established by Cognizant Technology Solutions Lithuania. A prize established by LinkMenų Fabrikas at Vilnius Gediminas Technical University (VGTU) – a three-month membership for prototyping, and the Sunrise Valley Science and Technology Park provided a three-month membership at co-working space Work’inn to develop and implement hackathon ideas.

Students from higher education institutions shall compete for a special prize – a semester at one of the best accelerators in Israel, Inno-Negev, under Erasmus+ programme. Students will have an opportunity to participate in entrepreneurship courses at Ben-Gurion University, meet potential investors, learn from experience of over 20 lecturers, get counselling from over 50 mentors and participate in an intensive training sessions.

Participants of Hack4Vilnius will also have an opportunity to win team tickets to Build Stuff 2019 (courtesy of Build Stuff Lithuania),the biggest conference for software developers in the Baltic States. Also, contestants can win Lux Express tickets for the whole team to Warsaw, Riga or Tallinn (courtesy of Lux Express) and the prize for the best mobility solution – 300 Eur “Amazon” voucher (courtesy of Trafi).

Everyone can contribute to the list of ideas for Vilnius

Any resident of Vilnius can submit their idea on how Vilnius could become a smarter, healthier, more active and cleaner city. Register your challenge for the hackathon’s participants: http://bit.ly/2YGnqxH

Hack4Vilnius participant registration is open until 16 September. Register for the hackathon here: http://bit.ly/2XLtxnV

Hack4Vilnius is organised by Vilnius University and its partners: the Sunrise Valley Science & Technology Park, Vilnius Gediminas Technical University, Go Vilnius, Cognizant Technology Solutions Lithuania, the Ministry of Economy and Innovation of the Republic of Lithuania, the Agency for Science, Innovation and Technology, and Innovation Week 2019.