As the curtains rise up on 2019, it’s time to look back at the amazing innovations that came out last year. We conducted over 400 hackathons with enterprises, universities, nonprofits, and governments in various fields, ranging from shaping the future of music to creating Fintech solutions.
The hackathon ideas of 2018 were judged based on the following 5 parameters:
Without further ado, here are the best hacks of 2018 in no particular order.
Category – Versatility
Hackathon – NITI Aayog Pune Smart City Hackathon
Geography – India
Theme – Public Health
Team name – Anashwar Tech
What is the hack? – Water disinfection container cover plate
What did we love about it? – This hack solves a real-world problem – access to safe drinking water. We loved how this simple hack makes use of a cover plate, purifying water in the container that it covers and also cleans itself at the same time! This fully working prototype uses digital purification from UV-C light to purify both the water and the container at the click of a button.
Category – Beginner Hack
Hackathon – Talent Hackathon – Centro Fox
Geography – Mexico
Team name – hectorjafeth_1be2
What is the hack? – BENTOXX – A nanocomposite to build a sustainable industrial process
What did we love about it? – A service aimed at sectors such as the paper industry, textile industry, and farming, BENTOXX implements a nanocomposite that removes and collects contaminating particles with Arduino-based electronics and microcontrollers. We really liked how the system can be used to monitor pH, turbidity, and temperature of water to build sustainable industrial processes.
Category – Consumer ease
Hackathon – World Music Hackathon
Geography – North America, Europe, Asia
Team name – kailasmoon_7258
What is the hack? – Untethered
What did we love about it? – Everyone wants to express themselves through music, but it takes years of practice to master an instrument. The goal is to make it possible for anyone to create music — and Untethered does exactly that. It’s AI interprets users’ gestures and enables them to intuitively control an instrument of their choice. The only requirements: a webcam and passion for music.
Category – Scalability
Hackathon – Blue Planet hackathon
Geography – Global
Team name – The Fraternity
What is the hack? – Efficient vertical axis water turbine
Theme – Pollution control
What did we love about it? – This new age water turbine hack helps generate electricity without the conventional dam model. The flexible design can be used for both small and large scale energy production by trapping energy from the surface of the water, irrespective of the flow of the water stream.
Category – Consumer ease
Hackathon – P&G Click Predict Innovate
Geography – India
Team name – Mellowain
What is the hack? – Mellowain: Queue problem in retail store
What did we love about it? – Remember the long checkout queues after you shop? What if there was no checkout anymore? What if you could just pick the items from the aisle, drop them into your cart and leave? Using motion capture and data augmentation, Mellowain detects the item, validates, and bills via the connected payment method.
Category – Security
Hackathon – Unisys Hackathon
Geography – India
Team name – Hypersign
What is the hack? – Hypersign – A cryptographic single sign-on solution
What did we love about it? – Hypersign is cryptography based SingleSignOn Solution that enables users to securely access applications without providing their access credentials. What caught our attention is this hacks ability to bring together cryptographic algorithms and equations in a mobile application thus totally eliminating the need for usernames and passwords. The Application further enables a user to securely sign transactions in decentralized environments; the Hyprsign SDK allows easy authentication to the Blockchain.
Category – Social Good
Hackathon – DeltaHacks IV
Geography – Canada
Team name – Aloud
What is the hack? – Aloud — granting seamless verbal narration of physical text materials.
What did we love about it? – 90% of the visually impaired have a partial visual impairment. Depending on the severity and cause, this leaves a wide range of ways to read, rather than Braille or waiting for the release of the audiobook. Aloud is a voice recognition tool that uses Amazon Alexa and StdLib to let users translate physical text material by taking a picture of the text.
Category –Women Empowerment
Hackathon – International Women’s hackathon – 2018
Geography – Global
Team name – Raikes Girls
What is the hack? – Rosie: Undermining Language Detector
Theme – Economic Freedom
What did we love about it? – This hack is a Chrome extension that detects undermining language and suggests more confident phrasing to help people represent themselves as the professionals they are. Named after Rosie the Riveter, an American symbol for female empowerment in the workplace, this is a great tool which can help women write confidently and have great business conversations. Check out their website here.
Category- Change Maker
Hackathon – Lumohacks 2018 – Canada’s Ultimate Health Hackathon
Geography – Canada
Team name – Compii
What is the hack? – Compassionate Intelligence
Theme – Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)/ Operational Stress Injury (OSI)
Technology used – AI, IoT, and Audibles
What did we love about it? -This hack tackles a major concern seen among military veterans and first responders – Operational Stress and Injury (OSI). Compii mobilizes the positive effects of social support. The social support intervenes at critical moments and empowers both individuals and their circle of trust to know when and how to act in times of emotional distress.
Category – Consumer ease
Hackathon – Cal Hacks 5.0
Geography – USA
Team name – JASK
What is the hack? – NavAR
What did we love about it? – While there are numerous navigation apps available for consumers, none of them work reliably and accurately indoors. The objective was to create an app that would highlight a path in the real world on your phone screen. This technology can be of great use to everyday citizens because it allows one to accurately navigate to a specific location in a building they have never been to before, such as a classroom in a campus. It is also useful in retail stores where the app can integrate with inventory databases to show customers the items they would want to purchase.
Want your ideas to turn into reality?
Check out the ongoing hackathons and find the one that suits you best.
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