MAKATI CITY, Philippines. (November 19, 2019) Startup founders, representatives from government agencies and private corporations, top executives and consultants, and hackathon participating teams hailing from 13 cities across the Philippines came together as Impact Hub Manila concludes the Impact Hackathon at the 2050fest - the ultimate pitching event held at The Eye, Green Sun Hotel in Makati City on November 19, 2019.
Mounting the biggest hackathon in the Philippines is no small feat for Impact Hub Manila, even during this era of coding marathons. Not only was it successfully executed, but Impact Hub Manila has welcomed and embraced the best team of coders and IT professionals from various industries to its community as they push forward a common goal: to utilize the untapped potential of the country and create new solutions to the existing social problems of the world. In the same event, the leadership of Impact Hub Manila also announced Impact Hackathon 2020, this time, spanning beyond the Philippines and extending throughout Asia Pacific.
The event featured talks from industry experts, gave what Asec. Kristian Ablan of the Presidential Communications and Operations Office as the "budding innovators" an insight to the public-private department relations in the startup landscape, along with the existing initiatives and programs they could benefit from. Several talks followed which pre-empted the actual pitching were concluded with a session about community building moderated by 18-year-old technologist Audrey Pe of WiTech (Women in Technology) who said that "community-building is not easy." Experts in the field, including the likes of Andrew Wong of E3 Entrepreneur Hub, Robert Reyes of Mozilla Philippines, and Eah Antonio of YFPH all likened it to child-bearing, birthing, and raising - from the labor pains to remembering the why while looking at your child, and just powering through. Wong had said that once the why (mission and vision for startups) is clear, "Nothing is impossible, impossible is nothing."
One of the main highlights of the event were the actual pitching, where 15 of the MVP projects were chosen from the Impact Hackathon and presented before an esteemed panel of jurors.
The finalists included Herbal Plant (Vigan), Kugel Tech (Baguio), Dashwerq (Iligan), Crimera (Bacolod), UPark (Iloilo), MedFind(Batangas), NutriScan(Manila), Help Aid(Davao), iServe (Catbalogan), Hemria (Catbalogan), Agua Meter (Bacolod), Transfarm (Manila), Ayamica (Iloilo), Asboc (Batangas), and Transcash (Metro Manila). The pitching which lasted for approximately two hours, had presenters, ranging from age 9 to beyond 30, showing the judges the workings of their conceptualized solutions in a bid for support. The pitching was shortly followed by deliberations which lasted for some time, and eventually concluded with the announcement of Transfarm as the National Impact Hackathon winner.
Transfarm walked away with 170,000 php (70,000 of which was from winning the Manila leg of the hackathon) in cash prize and a full year incubation program that includes a global membership access to the Impact Hub network, intensive training, access to vast pool of expert mentors, network, and coworking. The year long incubation program is valued at over 1,500,000 pesos.
The top 15 apart from receiving the prizes from winning the student (15,000 php) and professional category (20,000 php) will also be receiving a full year of incubation support from Impact Hub Manila.
The winning IT-based solution, Transfarm, is an end-to-end ecommerce and marketing solution, created in a bid to bridge the gap between the local producers and the large scale business consumers with the goal of enabling farmers to appropriately market their harvest and avoid wastage from oversupply.
The team who made the winning pitch said that they were from different backgrounds, but "from the Hackathon, [we] really did our best to collaborate, deliberate, and build the idea."
Some of the mentors and judges also offered support, starting with PLDT who said that they "don't just provide support" but are also "ready to co-incubate." Jhaze Asuncion of Upscale Innovations Lab and Department of Science and Technology Tech-Business Incubators (DOST-TBI) lauded Impact Hub for the "great opportunity for startups from the regions" and said, "We will be more than happy to support these startups if they will apply to us incubators."
“This is how startups are born. You change everything on the fly." says Rondario of Impact Hub and added, "This event is not the end. This is the beginning. It is Day 0 and the real work starts tomorrow."
After acknowledging the support and presence of this year's event sponsors including Quezon City Government under the leadership of Mayor Joy Belmonte, the Araneta Group, Asian Development Bank, PLDT, Smart, NutriAsia, Unilab, Department of Trade and Industry, Department of Science and Technology PCIEERD, Department of Information and Communication Technology, the Tourism Promotion Board of the DOT, Freidrich Neuman Foundation, Dentsu Aegis Network, The PhilStar Group, Businessworld SparkUp, Microsoft Philippines, ClinkIT, Green Sun Hotel, KMC Solutions, ASEANHR, GIZ Philippines, Forest Foundation Philippines,Mozilla Philippines Community, DevCon Philippines, 2030 Youth Force Philippines, Edukasyon, Canva, Manila Wordpress, Women In Technology, Women Who Code, When In Manila, Alfox Printing Services, Google Developers Philippines, Girls Who Code, Deskera, Pantheon, Manila Angel Investors Network, JobStream Philippines, Global Entrepreneurship Network, Veer Philippines, PhilRobotics, PCI Tech Innovation Center and many more, Rondario also extended an invitation for partnerships for the Impact Hackathon 2020, as they prepare to launch a regional hackathon next year.
Quezon City, Philippines – The world’s biggest hackathon, “Impact Hackathon”, is set to take place at the Smart Araneta Coliseum in Quezon City, Philippines, along with more hackathon coding-teams from over 15 nationwide locations simultaneously participating in this 24-hour on-the-spot coding marathon.With a mindset to be part of Guinness World Records history, Impact Hub Manila is interfacing with programmers, developers, and innovators towards creating sustainable solutions for specific problem statements proposed by the Hub’s multi-stakeholder partners.The current Guinness World Records (GWR) record-holder is the Hajj Hackathon, a coding event in Saudi Arabia with 2,950 participants. Impact Hackathon is an official attempt by Impact Hub Manila and its partners to break the said record by official GWR standards by activating more than 10,000 participants with 3,500 of them coding from a single venue in Quezon City – at the Smart Araneta Coliseum.Future-proofing today, envisioning 2050The Impact Hackathon teams will create technology-based solutions anchored to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals targeting global issues in Climate Change, Education, Agriculture, Smart Cities, and Health. These themes are specifically highlighted because of their global relevance and the ability of the hackathon participants from this part of the world to offer their own insight to efficiently address these issues.Described as one of the world’s most ambitious technology events this 2019, the Impact Hackathon also encourages its participants to think bigger and farther out into the future and use technology as a platform for scaling the impact. The main event organizer, Impact Hub Manila, has set the year 2050 as the horizon and viable target for these larger-scale solutions foreseen to roll-out from the hackathon event. 10,000+ Participants, 2,000 teams, and 800 mentorsEveryone’s going to be there!Besides more than 10,000 hackathon participants, Impact Hackathon brings together the biggest network of personalities representing brands from the technology, startup, and entrepreneurship sectors in the region. The Philippine Government, together with its local government units, and with various international government organizations, will proactively participate to ensure that Impact Hackathon will be a great global moment for incubating solutions and implementing large-scale delivery of these solutions.As one of the longest-running start-up incubators in the region, Impact Hub Manila is in cooperation and partnership with the following representatives of the government, private, start-up, and corporate sectors, namely: the Asian Development Bank, Dentsu Aegis Network, KMC, GIZ, SparkUP Business World, Forest Foundation, WWF, KumuMedia Technologies, Smart, PLDT, the Department of Science and Technology, the Department of Information and Communications Technology, the Department of Trade and Industry, the League of Cities of the Philippines, Microsoft, Team Bam Aquino, UnionBank, and Gawad Kalinga. The Impact Hub Manila with some of their partners for Impact Hackathon: KMC, GIZ, Department of Trade and Industry (HQ, EMB, and NCRO), SparkUp BusinessWorld, Forest Foundation, WWF Philippines, Gawad Kalinga, Department of Tourism, Team Bam Aquino, PLDT, UnionBank, Kumu Inc, Smart, and the Department of Energy.The Philippines as a mega solutions-incubator for the world“There are so many problems in the Philippines and in the region and where there are problems, there’s opportunity for entrepreneurship to rise. It opens the door for people to think, do, and be better,” says Impact Hub Manila Founder and CEO Ces Rondario. She adds that “this is a time for better thinking and solutions-finding, and the region and the Philippines can lead in this. This is our chance to define our future and the world in 2050. This is our time.”Impact Hub and Ces RondarioImpact Hackathon is the second of four installments of the larger Impact2050™ Program, an integrated and innovative multi-year entrepreneurial program that aims to catalyze the impact entrepreneurship ecosystem in the Asia-Pacific. The entire four-phase program–the Elevate National Startup Roadshow, Impact Hackathon, 2050fest, and Incubate 2020–was developed following the natural progression of a successful startup: education, ideation, discovery and networking, and incubation.
The four phases of the Impact2050 Program:the Elevate National Startup Roadshow, Impact Hackathon, 2050fest, and Incubate 2020 (not in the image as it is a for 2020 onwards)Impact Hub (Global Community – www.impacthub.net) is the world’s largest network of impact entrepreneurs with more than 17,000 members from more than 100 hubs located in more than 50 countries around the world. Impact Hub’s Global Community headquarters is in Vienna, Austria.Impact Hub Manila CEO and Founder, Ces Rondario is also the lead of Impact Hub Asia, with hubs in Cambodia, China, Indonesia, Japan, New Zealand, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, and Taiwan.Impact Hub Asia Pacific Lead and Impact Hub Manila Founder and CEO, Ces Rondario Highlighting the value of being part of a global community of entrepreneurs, Ces Rondario says: “I have always believed that access to opportunity is the key differentiator between those who make it and those who don't. That's why bringing in the global network of Impact Hub is so important, in that it's a platform for Filipino entrepreneurs to aspire for, helping them scale globally.”Registration and more informationTo be part of the world’s largest impact event for 2019, register at www.impact2050.com/tickets.Please visit www.impact2050.com/hackathon for more information about Impact Hackathon.Or send an email to Camille Lim camille.lim@impacthub.net.More aboutImpact Hub Global CommunityImpact Hub ManilaImpact HackathonImpact2050Tickets and registrationwww.impacthub.netwww.impacthub.phwww.impact2050.com/hackathonwww.impact2050.comwww.impact2050.com/ticketsThe digital version of this press release and the images in it can be downloaded from: www.impact2050.com/pressOCT8
