The first Rail Baltica Hackathon took place online from December 10 to 12 and, organised by the Rail Baltica joint venture RB Rail AS and innovation company “Helve”, brought together over 150 innovators and idea generators with a goal to facilitate new ideas around the infrastructure of the future, linking people, nations and places across the Baltics and beyond.
The Rail Baltica Hackathon was aimed to explore new and innovative ideas in either of the three core elements: Connectivity, Sustainability and Community. All together over 150 people from more than 20 countries joined the hackathon in various roles working on 17 solutions.
Hackathon ideas were evaluated by an expert jury composed of Wallace Green, Founding Partner at ActNow Ventures, Tomas Jankus, CEO at LAVA (Sustainable Business Association of Lithuania), Līva Pērkone, Co-founder and Managing Partner at Helve, Ignas Degutis, Chief of Staff at RB Rail AS, Ģirts Bramans, Head of Strategic Stakeholders and Communications at RB Rail AS and Veiko Haavapuu, CFO at RB Rail AS.
After 48 hours of work developing the submitted ideas,10 teams made it to the final and were competing for a prize fund of 9000 euros. Top three ideas that were best matching the evaluation criteria got awarded: “Your story” (a mobile app “Arnee”, a self-guided adventure create by locals and powered by AR solution), “Attend Baltica” (noise monitoring solution for sustainable rail transportation) and “Contai” (a last-mile concept to the Fast train – Fast delivery business and use case as a vertical solution). “We would like to thank all the teams, who took a creative look at the Rail Baltica, showing how many opportunities and added-value the global project will bring to the region. Innovative ideas and principles of sustainability are the basis for the greenfield rail transport infrastructure project development,” said Ignas Degutis, Chief of Staff at RB Rail AS.
“What we witnessed during the 48-hour hackathon was truly remarkable! Around 150 highly motivated, private individuals, coming together over a weekend to shape new business ideas that have the potential to make Rail Baltica a better version of its current self. It was my first hackathon, and it was super cool to play a small part in the process. I get goosebumps thinking about the potential impact of hackathons to bring people and companies together to discover new paths forward. So big congratulations to Rail Baltica for showing the way. And hopefully other companies will follow their lead and eventually we all find our way to a better Europe, in a future where we live in balance and harmony with our planet,” said Wallace Green, Founding Partner at ActNow Ventures.
The video presentations of the finalists can be found at the official Rail Baltica Hackathon event page: eventornado.com/event/rail-baltica-hackathon
Pre-event: https://www.facebook.com/events/1226676697819773
Event opening: https://www.facebook.com/events/4794664510647074
Team presentations: https://www.facebook.com/events/308695527790382
and eventornado.com/event/rail-baltica-hackathon
Awards ceremony: https://www.facebook.com/events/587224792365248