I’m still recovering from BikeHack19! It was intensive, fun and interesting for many reasons. I’m constantly being asked ..What happened?! So, here’s a summary snapshot of each day at BikeHack19. Congrats to all involved. Well done all! NG.
What happened at BikeHack19?
Previously, I posted details about the upcoming BikeHack19 event in Brisbane. BikeHack19 is Australia’s first hackathon-style event where teams work to address the challenge of getting more people on bikes more often in Queensland.
It was a 45-hour intense event
There were 90+ people, 79 hackers, 26 pitches, 13 final teams, 3 business development masterclasses, 3 mentor round-robin sessions and 1 customer focus group (30 pax) and a final pitch to an expert panel of 4 judges who decided on the prize winners. PHEW!
There was $25,000 in prize money for the 4 main categories as well as other additional prizes.
Friday Day 1: Initiation
The event started 5 pm Friday night.
On arrival, there was time for hackers and organisers to meet-and-greet and network before the official opening.
The opening address had guest speeches by the Minister for Transport and Main Roads The Honourable Mark Bailey, Matthew Longland (Deputy Direct Generals Translink TMR), Adam Rogers (Director, Cycling & Walking TMR) and Matt McQuaid (Client Director Aurecon).
The event was facilitated by Aaron Kirby who did a great job of keeping all the teams motivated and on task all weekend. At this stage, Aaron ran participants through a warm-up game Is that your personality in your pocket? – a fun activity to get the hackers interacting and set the scene well for the ideas pitch and team formation yet to come.
A quick aside note..during the weekend, Aaron also set an additional challenge for hackers to: connect with 10 people, teach someone a skill, stay involved and build something awesome – another great way to mingle and share skills with other teams.
After the warm-up game, was the initial ideas pitch.
This is an important element of hackathons because its where hackers get to share their ideas – and its the first time other participants hear and chose what projects they might want to work on for the rest of the weekend.
Overall, there were 28 1-minute ideas pitched to the audience. Below are my quick notes on each idea and the pitches with a star next to them ended up forming teams that night (with others teams being added on Saturday).
If you’ve not been to
We then got to vote for our favourite 3 ideas and started forming teams.
Some of the teams and people changed, joined, splintered and morphed over the next 12 hours until the teams were fully set by 10 am Saturday.
Then it was game on.
Saturday – Day 2: Development
After an 8 am breakfast, teams got started working on
It was an intense day.
Many teams were still getting to know each other, as well as running around the city (and online), doing customer validations, continuing research, and developing and consolidating what their actual project/idea was.
From 8.30am until 6 pm, teams had a series of startup workshops (like how to use a Lean Startup model, Facebook Ads, and the event Slack platform) and a constant round-robin of consultation with mentors, industry experts, sponsors and subject matter experts.
Each mentor session added an extra layer of complexity, understanding and reality to the projects. Mentor whiplash!
At
At 6 pm, all the teams had 10 mins each to explain their ideas to a focus group of 30 people who gave immediate feedback and asked questions – everyone was exhausted by this stage.
Sunday – Day 3: Final Day
After another early start, the morning sessions included a workshop on the final pitch and another series of last-minute mentor meetings to finalise ideas.
By lunch, all teams were working on final pitch rehearsal and preparation.
At 3 pm, all worked stopped. All team PPTs were submitted.
Guests started arriving for the final
For final pitches, each team had a 5-min to present with a PPT (and other realia or prototypes) to a panel of 4 judges.
The four judges, Neil Scales OBE, Evelyn Storey, Peter Bourke and Majella Edwards.
The judging criteria: Validation, Business Model and Execution.
Here’s the final team panel pitch order:
Individual BikeHack19 Awards
A big thank you also to Prof. Rowena Barrett and QUT (Queensland University of Technology) Business School, (QUT Fondary and QUT Real World) who offered 5 additional cash and recognition prizes to individual hackers.
- Spirit of the Hack
- Best social media engagement
- Hustler Award
- People’s Choice
- Pivot Award
It was a real honour to receive the Spirit of the Hack Award. It was a little embarrassing when the Aaron asked the whole room to stand up and point to the person they think embodied the spirit of the event – and everyone pointed to me! I was awarded it for helping other teams, being enthusiastic and having a passion for getting more people on bikes – of course!
Beyond BikeHack19
This BikeHack event must have been a massive effort to get organised.
As a participant, I was impressed by how available and supportive the organisers and sponsors were over the whole weekend.
Congrats and thanks to all!
A massive big thank you to the amazing sponsors, organisers, mentors and volunteers who made this weekend possible.
This includes event organisers Fishburners Sarah and Issac who were particularly outstanding. Sarah I will not forget your stairwell help! Fishburners supplies a brilliant range of inspiration, collection and connection to support tech startups including a collaborative office space in Brisbane.
Aurecon supplied their amazing office for the event. It was an absolute delight being able to work in their office space – thank you!
The TMR Queensland staff were always on hand to answer questions and help out where and whenever they were needed.
And kudos to the supporting sponsors Deloitte, 99 Bikes, Pedal, Merida and event facilitator Aaron Birkby.
I think all the teams did really well and as a participant I can appreciate all the extra hard work behind the scenes that no-one else sees. I also commend all the teams on their final pitches – it is such a difficult thing to do.
Below are the 4 category winners and the DG’s special prize.
Overall it was an epic event. The weekend was full of the necessary ups and downs that come with hackathons, startups and working with new people.
A big congrats to all the hackers who participated and gave their time, skills, ideas and energy to help explore ideas get more people on bikes more often in Queensland.
Great job everyone!
See you for the next BikeHack!
