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What Happened at the HackQuantum Blockchain Hackathon 2018?

Jul 9, 2018, 3:20AM
1 min, 35 sec READ

Close to 300 teams competed at the HackQuantum Blockchain Hackathon weekend. The challenge? Achieve gender equity and solve world hunger. Easy.

London Fintech Week kicked off Friday with the HackQuantum Blockchain Hackathon weekend. The challenge, titled "Women and Global Hunger", was sponsored by Decade of Women, whose organizers were looking for "projects that will have a social impact and improve financial inclusion", in line with the 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals. The hackathon particularly targeted those projects that combine the "exponential power of women with blockchain, smart contracts and digital assets". 

Launched by the 5th Element Group, Decade of Women is a campaign that is dedicated to uniting women with universal frontier technologies, in an effort to achieve gender equity. The campaign focuses on levereging the vital power of frontier technologies across blockchain and digital assets to at last achieve economic engagement and financial independence of all women.

The Challenge

The teams were challenged to leverage blockchain for social impact besides using blockchain for financial inclusion. They were asked to come up with a solution to elevate

Gender equity into quantum leaps for paradigm-changing impact and last mile solutions to ensure we meet SDG Goal #2 of No Hunger.

The teams were judged on several criteria, including

  • Originality
  • Innovation and Impact
  • Scalability of the idea and solution
  • Exponentiation of cross-silo, cross-industry collaboration
  • Women - teams with women developers
  • Can the solution affect the lives of at least one billion people by 2030?

The Winners

In addition to a cash prize of £2,500, the two winning teams also won a full suite of Business Development Training, publicity, and the opportunity to showcase their solutions in front of impact investors, NGO's, philanthropists, and more at London Fintech Week, as well as in front of the UN later this year.

The winning teams, announced last night, are Wastecurb and SoftPower, who will pitch at London Fintech Week.  

Disclaimer: information contained herein is provided without considering your personal circumstances, therefore should not be construed as financial advice, investment recommendation or an offer of, or solicitation for, any transactions in cryptocurrencies.