How we experimented with a successful product hackathon with just $150
Hello there!
I know you’re wondering how we accomplished it, so I’ll tell you now. It’s true that we organized a 48-hour hackathon to foster the creation of new products by the Akure city startup ecosystem’s young people. However, we will concentrate on the event’s surrounding aspects in this piece, while financial specifics will be elaborated on in the following.
In addition, before I begin the report, it would be helpful if I provided a brief geographical overview of Akure. Note: This is an excerpt from a report I wrote on the HACK MAY product hackathon.
Akure, Nigeria’s second-largest city and capital of Ondo State, is located in the southwest.
[3] The city’s population was estimated at 484,798 people in the 2006 census. For the time being, that’s all there is to know. Brief? Yes, I’ll keep it short. :)
However, if I may add, Akure City, Nigeria’s next thriving startup ecosystem, could be on its way.
To be clear, I never suggested it was already there.
However, some communities in that region are dedicated to making that possibility a reality. There are intriguing details regarding the city’s surroundings, such as the fact that the Federal University of Technology Akure is located there (FUTA). An active startup ecosystem is built on the foundation of an active technology sector.
To that end, a growing number of companies are emerging from the neighborhood on a regular basis, and that number is only going to grow in the future. There is no doubt that Hack May will serve as a catalyst for significant growth in the city’s startup ecosystem, particularly for companies developing and releasing new products. After that, I’ll return to my account of Hack May:
Hack May is a 48-hour product hackathon, the first of its kind in the Akure startup ecosystem. The hackathon is geared towards fast-tracking the development between ideation stages to a minimum viable product.
Also, a very important key to note is that the hackathon was designed to therefore be in partnership with different student technical communities that will help speed up the development of products, solve problems, and provide value to contribute to global developments.
The partnering organizations were Google Developers Student community, Github student community, TME Education Poland, and techcafe.com.ng. Working with these organizations helps ensure sustainability given they possess a convergence of skilled and talented students.
Brief Overview and statistics on Hackathon
A hackathon is a design sprint-like event; often, in which computer programmers and others involved in software development, including graphic designers, interface designers, project managers, domain experts, and others collaborate intensively on software projects
Hackathons have produced huge and extensive results involving the development of products that have now become major enterprises and startups. A good example is fireflies, a unique collaboration tool born out of a Massachusetts Institute of Technology hackathon.
One of the great benefits of hackathons is that they are proving grounds for new ideas. They’re especially good tools to stimulate the creative and problem-solving juices of developers. Unlike their day jobs where risk-taking may be frowned upon, in a hackathon, there is a low cost of failure.
Loving it? Try to catch the rest of the report here
And try not to forget to look out to this space for more important articles in the coming days!
Shalom!
