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Hackathons are a serious business. Especially when it comes to CIMB’s 3D Digital Data Disruption Conquest Hackathon. The Malaysia Stage Final took place over two days concluding on Saturday 1^st December.

Before the winners were announced, CIMB’s Chief People Office Dato’ Hamidah Naziadin  surprised the audience by telling the teams that everyone who made the final stage of the event was hired. She shed a bit more light on the statement explaining that CIMB HR will reach out each individual to make them a conditional offer of employment with the bank. It was more than a nice touch, it was CIMB showing in real terms why events like these are more than just community service.

The business world is in transformation and companies like CIMB are thirsting to find creative and imaginative minds inside people who can apply themselves to real world tasks, and Hackathons are a great way to discover these people.

There is no denying the public service benefit of the event, putting young people directly in touch with industry gurus to mentor them from idea to prototype to business pitch is of huge value. The net effect being that CIMBs 3D Conquest is proving to be a win – win for organiser and participants alike.

Disruptive Tech Asean’s Group Publisher Andrew Martin from Holding Company Asia Online Publishing Group was asked to join the panel of judges for the FinTech competition and confirmed that the standard of competition was high, presentation quality impressive and ideas innovative. Finalists included a team that were prototyping an app that helps users build savings for funeral expenses, to an e-wallet app for teenagers than links to a parental control app to ensure parents can monitor their children’s spending and teach them good financial habits by rewarding things like saving. A group from Thailand showed their concept for a trading training application for millennials which helps young people to master stock trading in a simulated environment.

Many of the ideas that were fleshed out over the 48-hour session were well thought through and had already undergone the scrutiny of mentors from the commercial world to route issues like legality and technical barriers to success. The result was that when time came for pitching, the contestants had already undergone a first level of scrutiny that ensured their ideas held up to the realities of the real world.

This intensive scrutiny and hands on access to mentors delivered the win-win we spoke of earlier. The students got a taste of how tough and uncompromising the real world can be, the organizers just may have created a platform for some real gems of ideas to actually become commercial realities down the track.

The competition was fierce as all teams pitched to a first group of judges who selected the 5 finalists. They will then go through to a detailed pitch to a second round of judges. What became clear through the process is that the participants had built a camaraderie that extended between teams and universities. With those that progresses commiserating with those that did not. These friendships could very likely be the formative stages of valuable professional networks for everyone that took part.

The Malaysia Stage country winners by category were as follows:

Data Science Winners

1^st Place  – The Datanian – Asia Pacific University

2^nd Place –  Data Munchers – Monash University

3^rd Place –  Wai Pui – Nottingham & University Malaya

4^th Place –  Orca – Monash University

5^th Place –  Pegacorn – UTAR

Coding winners

1^st Place –  Mamadei – University Tunku Abdul Rahman

2^nd Place –  Team O one – Monash University

3^rd Place – Krazy Koding Klub – Asia Pacific university

4^th Place –  The Pantheon – First University College & University Malaysia Sarawak

5^th Place – The Dunno – Asia Pacific University

Fintech Winners

1^st Place –  JAKE  – University of Reading Malaysia

2^nd Place –  Vest Your Time  – Thammasat University (Thailand)

3^rd Place – Fintech Hero Universiti Teknologi Petronas & Universiti Teknologi MARA

4^th Place –  Thunder – Mahidol University International College

5^th Place – MatRunner – Universiti Teknologi Petronas

Each 1^st placed team walked away with $3000 USD, and afore mentioned Job Offer from CIMB are going out to all team members of all the teams mentioned above. For the category winners, they also earned a place in the grand final that takes place in January. However, judging from the looks of joy on the on the faces of the winning teams, the sheer achievement of winning this hotly fought contest looked to be the biggest reward of all.

Team JAKE add some role play to their pitch

Team MatRunner facing tough questions from the judges

Team Thunder an all girl team from Thailand
with an idea to simplify currency exchange.