
Not too long ago, JET Workflow, Disruptive Tech Asia of the Asia Online Publishing Group (APOG) and Malaysia’s Sunway University embarked on a most ambitious project: To hold Low-Code-A-Thon, a low-code app making competition for college students. It would be a risk no doubt. After all, the workload in the academe at this level is already demanding and interest in app making among Malaysia’s youth is a great unknown.
In short, JET, AOPG and Sunway were treading uncharted territory, and success—or even a sliver of it—was far from guaranteed. The three pushed through anyway, and the results are, as AOPG co-founder Andrew Martin put it, “Amazing.”
Martin, in the closing webinar that drew the curtains down on this ambitious Low-Code-A-Thon, lauded the participants—students of Sunway University—for their fascinating apps, which he says exceeded the high expectations he had to begin with. He also made special mention of Sunway’s tireless efforts and utmost professionalism in making this collaboration with JET and AOPG the success that it has been.
“I was hoping to be amazed by what I saw in this competition, and I was really excited to see what things you (participants) came up with, what ideas you had and how well you could execute those ideas,” said Martin in his opening keynote. “I am pleased to say that I was genuinely amazed. But there was something that surprised me. I expected to be amazed by the competition itself and the entries that you put in and the applications you came up with. But something else amazed me just as much as the competition entries themselves, and that was just how professional the Sunway Analytics Society, Board of Directors and the committee members have been.”
The Superstars of Low-Code-A-Thon
The Low-Code-A-Thon was conceptualised to demonstrate how even non-coders can develop an app given the right platform. The superstars of this competition were definitely the participants themselves—students from Sunway who took time out of their busy schedules to think of app ideas, develop them to completion and present them in a formal yet compelling manner.
And the turnout, to quote Martin again, was amazing and the output, even more so. This prompted AOPG’s affable co-founder to declare, “Malaysia is in safe hands with you guys (participants). You (Malaysia) have some really smart and imaginative people that are going to be coming to the workforce, and it was really impressive what you did.”
What made it all the more impressive, according to Dr Angela Lee Siew Hoong, Associate Professor and Assistant Head of Department at Sunway University, was how the student-participants managed to come up with such fantastic apps despite their hectic schedules and heavy academic workload.
“We are very happy to have received a lot of participation from you all despite your heavy workload on your study, and yet you still managed to join the competition,” said Dr Angela. “We are really grateful that you took up this challenge, and you spent time in learning a new platform, which is really good for your own fundamentals and a really good career builder in the future.”
All apps submitted to the Low-Code-A-Thon have interesting and compelling use cases, and every one of them would have deserved a spot in the winners’ circle. But as in any competition, there could only be one grand champion.
The Best of the Best
After some painstaking deliberation, judges from JET, AOPG and Sunway agreed that the big winner is Team Purple and their app called TescoLab. The group of Silinda Lu Pey Qi, Tang Su Yee and Lee Sin had seen that Tesco, the world’s third-largest retailer based on gross revenue, had pressing issues to address, like the shutdown of physical stores, insufficient and poor customer service, negative reviews on staff performance and inefficiencies due to highly manual tasks, and so they set out to solve these.
Enter TescoLab, which Team Purple heralds as an all-in-one solution to these same issues. Among the things this app promises to do are enhance customer service through a platform that enables customers to voice their concerns, and allow the company to monitor and evaluate employee performance regularly, help with social media marketing and automate repetitive, manual tasks.
“We went through a lot of articles online and we found out that Tesco is lacking in certain aspects such as customer communication and food waste management,” explained Qi when asked why Team Purple chose the retail giant. “We also noticed that Tesco helps with recycling food waste by donating to non-profit organisations in Malaysia. Not a lot of people actually notice that part, so we decided to pick Tesco as our company to work on their application.”
Yee, meanwhile, explained the thought process behind the features Team Purple found in TescoLab. She pointed out that the group’s background in data analytics, which Qi, Sin and Yee are all pursuing, is the reason they included provisions for social media management, employee performance tracking and more. Sin, on the other hand, described JET Workflow as “great” and something organisations should be using to improve organisational performance.
Joining Team Purple in the winners’ circle are second runners-up Kafka and their Kafka Connect app and third placers Mumbo Jumbo and their Medicare app. The former, co-developed by Kelvin Lee Kean Wyn, Toh Zhenben and Ng Siang Yee, will connect individuals and businesses to non-profits to make it easy and convenient to donate to organisations in need of supplies and assistance. The latter, conceptualised by Foo Khai Liang, Chun Hanssen and Shahab Mahmoud Areek, will help people keep and monitor their medical records, book appointments with doctors and access healthcare plans.
The winning teams, Team Purple, Kafka and Mumbo Jumbo, received RM1,000, RM500 and RM250 for their efforts—and, quite possibly, the distinction of being the inaugural winners of Low-Code-A-Thon should it become an annual showcase.
Mission Accomplished
In his own keynote, Jin Chong, Founder of JET Workflow, emphasised why JET, AOPG and Sunway partnered to hold this Low-Code-A-Thon: For everyone to have fun, for the organisers “to find out things we don’t even know we don’t know,” and to give the participants a chance to learn—and ultimately use these learnings to add value in whatever they will do in the future.
It goes without saying that it is mission accomplished for JET, AOPG and Sunway University. Everyone had fun, the organisers discovered quite a few things, and the participants learned plenty, from using a low code app-making platform to spotting problems and coming up with logical solutions.
So, is anybody up for Low-Code-A-Thon Version 2.0 next year?
To find out more about Low Code App Development, click on the link below to download our Executive Briefing Note.


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