Student car-pool app Hitch wins the 2016 DCU Hackathon #HackDCU

Hitch, a car-pool app which allows student drivers and fellow students to connect and share transport was the winning idea at the 2016 DCU Hackathon #HackDCU announced on Sunday, March 6th.

Luke Scales, Jaime Badiola Ramos, Shane Carter, Oisín Hoy, Pedro Neto and Eva Christie, all students at DCU beat off stiff competition from over 120 students at the DCU Hackathon (Friday, March 4th to Sunday, March 6th).

The event, organised by DCU Ryan Academy invited students from a range of disciplines to come together in a 72 hour enterprise boot-camp and to come up with ideas which could form the basis for a credible enterprise start-up. Representatives from Accenture, AIB, the Irish Exporters Association of Ireland in addition to mentors from numerous enterprise and software start-ups in Dublin, attended the second ever student Hackathon at DCU.

Luke Scales, a third year Mechatronic Engineering student; Jaime Badiola Ramos, a first year Global Business student; Shane Carter, a first year Business Studies student; Oisín Hoy, a second year Global Business student; Pedro Nesto, a third year Analysis and Design international student at the School of Engineering and Computing and Eva Christie, a second year Education and Training student devised their winning idea to enable students to share resources and save time and money. The winning team received a prize fund of €1000 plus free flights and accommodation to Berlin for a major StartUp Europe Hackathon taking place in June, funded by the Welcome initiative under StartUp Europe. The team will also apply for a place on the prestigious UStart Student accelerator programme run by DCU Ryan Academy.

Speaking about the event CEO of the DCU Ryan Academy Eoghan Stack said: “Hackathon 2016 is an important event as it enables students to come together in a creative and entrepreneurial environment, devise ideas and come up with a product which possesses the key elements to enable that idea to transform into a credible start-up company. It nurtures a spirit of entrepreneurship amongst the student community; assists in honing their skill set and expanding their knowledge base and imbues them with a sense of purpose and ambition about pursing an entrepreneurial path. The DCU Ryan Academy and DCU are proud to be at the forefront of providing an enterprise environment for budding entrepreneurs with access to expert knowledge and skills. Congratulations to this year’s winning team and we look forward to working with them.”

This year’s Hackathon judging panel included Ian Lucey, founder and CEO of Lucey Technologies and the Lucey Fund. Lucey Technologies is a software company with offices in Dublin, London, LA and Bilbao. Kim Pham, Head of Platform, Frontline Ventures; Claire O’ Connell, Journalist with the Irish Times and Silicon Republic and holder of a PhD in Cell Biology and Noel King, VP of Engineering at VSware and Founder of CoderDojo Girls Photo caption:

For more information on the DCU Ryan Academy click here