Ideas around ‘Going dutch’, children’s finance and alternative banking cards take Prizes at Ulster Bank ‘Hackathon’

Ideas around ‘Going Dutch’, children’s finance and alternative banking cards took the top prizes at the Ulster Bank Hackathon held in partnership with the Open Bank Project at Dogpatch Labs in Dublin last night.

The three-day event brought together coders, designers, mentors and other attendees to generate new ideas, solutions and prototypes to make the Bank stronger and more sustainable; to disrupt the established way of working through mobile and wearable tech, and social collaboration and to focus on design that places an emphasis on people and user experience.

The three winning teams are:

• SUSTAIN: Gift Graft Grow – who each won a set of Beats wireless headphones with their idea on children’s finance
• DISRUPT: Go Dutch – who each won an AR Parrot Drone with their idea on splitting bills
  Pictured is Robin Marshall, CIO, Ulster Bank with “Go Dutch”, Rafael Santigo, Edmundo Frota, Diogo Henrigue, JB Neto, Jose Henrique Ventura, Leandro Iwai.
  Picture by Shane O’Neill Photography.
• DESIGN: Pop Card – who each won an Apple Watch with their idea on alternative cards in banking

Additional prizes were also awarded for youth-targeted idea (Save with Penny) and best technical achievement (Fit 4 Good and Stay Alert) over the weekend.

Pictured is Robin Marshall, CIO, Ulster Bank with “Save with Penny” Valerie Yuskevych and Sohail Amin.
Picture by Shane O’Neill Photography. 

Pictured is Robin Marshall, CIO, Ulster Bank with “Stay Alert”, Will Carmichael, Mark Enright, Jordan Burnett.
Picture by Shane O’Neill Photography.

Friday’s opening session generated a wide range of concepts which were then distilled into 14 ideas. The teams then worked throughout the weekend to develop software applications using a number of APIs including a prototype of the RBS API ‘Blue Bank’ and the Open Bank Project API system.

Each group was mentored by technical, design, investor and other advisers from SWIFT, CurrencyFair, Bookbuzz, Zendesk, Each and Other, Temenos, RBS and Ulster Bank to help them to sharpen their ideas into a proposition to pitch to the judges on Sunday afternoon.

Commenting on the event, Robin Marshall, CIO, Ulster Bank and member of the judging panel said:

“Firstly, a huge congratulations to the winners who emerged over the weekend. The energy in Dogpatch over the last three days has been incredible, with the perfect balance of collaboration and competitive edge. Engaging with the FinTech community in a collaborative way is essential for Ulster Bank as we strive to become the number one bank for customer service, trust and advocacy. I look forward to working more with the winners and other competitors over the coming months.”

Simon Redfern, founder of the Open Bank Project and CEO of TESOBE said:

“I think it’s fair to say that everyone was a winner this weekend. Hard working fun led to some brilliant Fintech projects emerging from the bits, bytes and APIs at the event. Special congratulations goes to the worthy winners! It was a pleasure as always to work with Ulster Bank who bring a special spirit to the Hack Make the Bank events – and Dogpatch labs was the perfect host for the hive of creative activity that ensued!”.”

Patrick Walsh, Managing Director, Dogpatch Labs said:

“It’s been a real joy to witness cutting edge concepts and projects emerge at the Ulster Bank Hackathon at Dogpatch Labs.  Creative talent like this represents the very best of Fintech innovation, and the scale of the event this weekend demonstrates the huge potential for Dublin and Ireland on an international level.”