BOOST Hackathon
About this good practice
The hybrid BOOST Hackathon was organized in Patras, from 25 to 31 May 2020, by CTI “Diophantus".
Capitalizing on the successful Chatbot experience from the Autonomous Province of Trento, BOOST Hackathon was organized to promote the development of programming applications and ideas in the fields of Open Social Innovation and Open Data, in the framework of the EU co-financed project OSIRIS and the pilot action "BOOST-Boost Open Data usage at the Region of Western Greece".
In a week full of Online Seminars, Events and Networking actions, participants had the opportunity to familiarize themselves with the technologies of exploiting Open Data and Developing Innovative Applications in order to develop and implement their own business ideas.
BOOST Hackathon was attended by students, engineers, researchers, programmers, startuppers, who formed teams and created new applications and services. Representatives of innovative companies acted as mentors, guiding the Hackathon teams in the design of their applications. Open data were provided by the participating companies, the Municipality of Patras and the Ministry of Digital Governance of Greece.
The central point of reference was the co-creative space POS4work, but the teams participated mainly online.
During and after the process, all participants were supported to commercialize their technological applications, describe their Business Idea, transform it into a complete Business Plan and claim initial funding for a start-up business.
Resources needed
The event was organized by the team of CTI “Diophantus” (5 people) in cooperation with POS4work (2 people).
The tools used for virtual participation included electronic platforms for web meetings, livestreaming in social media and selected applications for file uploading and presentation creation.
Evidence of success
More than 800 people watched the livestream of most preparatory webinars, along with approximately 50 participants. 20 participants completed successfully the 2-day competition event, the Hackathon. The hybrid mode made it possible for people from all over Greece to participate, with the Grand Winners participating in full remote mode and the Best Chatbot winning team co-working only by using electronic tools.
The event set the basis for the organization of other similar events in the area.
Potential for learning or transfer
The most useful outcome of this effort is that it provided new alternatives for organizing a co-creation event, in times when co-working in the same room was difficult. The people working on organizing the event gained a great deal of knowledge in terms of remote cooperation and available tools, and used this experience to their work from that point on, both in OSIRIS project and elsewhere.
The difficulty occurring from the health protection measures implemented in the pandemic period actually created new opportunities, giving the ability to people from all of Greece to participate in the Hackathon, thus expanding the candidate participants’ pool and also the audience that followed the activities of OSIRIS.
This is the greatest lesson learned from the hybrid BOOST Hackathon: co-creation can exist and thrive with both in person and remote co-working. Opportunities that can expand its impact can appear through smart approach and adaptation, no matter how difficult the circumstances.
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