The Hackathon is an initiative of the HackLab, with a major partnership this year from Ashesi Design Lab, International Business Machines (IBM) and Twitter. Fantastic support also came from institutions (amongst many) such as Stanbic Bank, German Cooperation, Vodafone and QodeHub. Media Coverage of the event was undertaken by WatsUpTek, Cartymedia, Ninety3 studios, Digital Times Africa, and a plethora of other great media outlets.
The exciting theme for this Year’s Hackathon was Leveraging Artificial Intelligence to drive Digital Transformation in Africa, with a focus on healthcare, agriculture, education, eCommerce, transportation, internet of things, and financial technology.
A total of eight-hundred participants, across eighteen tertiary institutions, graced the virtual event; which spanned a total of three days. The event truly lived up to its buzz! From the ninth of April to the eleventh of April 2021, an impressive ten workshop tracks were available for participation. Benefits included over one hundred internship and job opportunities, as well as coaching and mentorship sessions for participants.
To launch the series of events, a pre-event session was conducted by IBM, in which a tour of the IBM Watson AI studio was given. On the official premier day, two panel discussions were conducted. The first on shaping the future of AI & tech policy for; education, work and information, with discussion mediated by Lily E. Botsyoe, Head of community Engagement for the HackLab foundation. The second discussion focused on the role of AI and data in transforming the service industry, Day two proceeded to tackle the future of artificial intelligence for agriculture, while the final day of the event addressed the future of AI for mobility, healthcare & advertising.
To crown the series, this year’s competition was won by a student team from Ashesi University. The Team, popularly called, “Zetta” include members: Hannah Lormenyo (B.Sc. Electrical Engineering), William Akuffo (B.Sc. Electrical Engineering), and Sandra Nettey (B.Sc. Management Information Systems). The trio worked within the union of artificial intelligence and healthcare to ideate a project on electroencephalography (brain scans) for children with autism, who do not have access to testing facilities.
Interview with the Winning Team
We caught up with the winning team and had a keyword discussion with them. Their responses were beyond insightful. When asked what meaning the team name, Zetta holds to them, Netty expatiates: “Zetta is the scientific representation for ten raised to the power twenty-one. We are in the year 2021. Hannah and William will graduate in 2021.”
Their idea centered on a headset, which makes use of electroencephalographic technology to read impulses from the cerebral region of children. This is done to identify early symptoms in the autism spectrum. When asked for the source of inspiration for their project, they enthuse:
“We know and love children in the Autism Spectrum, we are motivated by their personalities and drive. In Africa, unfortunately— we don’t pay a lot of attention to these kids and their potentials. It was a good place to look at, since we wanted to focus on healthcare.”
We asked if winning the Hackathon presents any opportunity to usher their idea into reality, and Akuffo gave a very analytical response:
“I personally wouldn’t say that it is a direct endpoint to success. Maybe, as a result, we might be able to network with people who have an interest in our project; that is one avenue to the realization of our idea. Also, equally important is the morale boost we received from our victory. It testifies to the greatness of the idea.” Lormenyo then chimed in: “One of the prizes for the Hackathon is a startup grant with terms and conditions. We expect to use this grant in developing our prototypes, perhaps launching it as well.”
Generously, they shared a few words for other upcoming developers:
“To upcoming developers, don’t give up and never allow yourself to feel like you are not good enough for a job, a competition, or an opportunity. You can only grow yourself when you challenge yourself. So challenge yourself to do great things, join developer communities and be active in them too.” says Lormenyo.
Akuffo agrees, so much so that he channels South African space entrepreneur, Elon Musk.
“For any developer who wants to build any kind of product, I recount a word of advice I picked from Elon Musk; Developers should ask themselves this question; what is the delta utility to the current state of the art, and how does it affect the lives of people? It is not enough to simply make a product and work on an idea. What difference is there in it, compared to existing technologies? How will it impact people’s lives? When all this questions are answered, then as a developer—go for it.
Since its inception in 2015, HackLab has directly impacted over 8000 people.
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