A recap of SWSG Mega 2018!
This September, Startup Weekend Singapore returned with a bang! SWSG Mega 2018 saw 43 teams graduate with some of the most unique and impactful ideas following the theme of this year’s hackathon — Open Innovation. The hackathon, supported by GovTech, brought together 30 mentors, 14 judges and 3 guest speakers — Dr Janil Puthucheary, Teo Ser Luck and Grace Fu.
During the Weekend
SWSG Mega 2018 kicked off on Friday evening, with over 300 participants checking in at the event site to collect their free goodie bags and lanyards indicating their title (Hustler, Developer, Designer) before heading to the main auditorium for their welcome reception.
As the evening progressed, it was time for the first pitch of the hackathon. The cohort was split into 2 groups — A and B, before interested participants proceeded to pitch their ideas to the floor. The teams were formed thereafter, adopting the top ideas with the highest votes.
As the night got older, some of the teams left to catch up on their sleep, while a good number stayed through the night to continue hacking away with their ideas.
Saturday was all about mentoring, workshops and hacking away! Some of the mentors who came down to help our participants include Sang Shin (Director, Temasek), Li Hongyi (Deputy Director, GovTech), Ng Jing Shen (Co-founder and CEO, Paktor) and many other experts in the industry!
The highlight of Saturday was the surprise appearance of a very special guest, Patrick Collison, Co-founder and CEO of Stripe! Patrick’s arrival came as a pleasant surprise to our participants who had no idea he would be coming down that night to share some of his personal tips with them. It is truly an honor to met this young prodigy and certainly our first time meeting a billionaire in the flesh! His concluding advice for our participants was to have fun and make the most out of their hackathon experience!
And finally, after two long and hectic nights, it was the arrival of Sunday — the most exciting day of the hackathon! All the hustling and hard work of the participants for the past 2 days was about to be paid off on this very day! To close the event on the best note possible, SWSG received a panel of experienced and renowned judges to crown the most deserving teams as winners of this year’s hackathon. Our lineup of judges came from diverse backgrounds, including Kok Ping Soon (CEO, GovTech), Chng Kai Fong (Managing Director, EDB) and Michael Blakey (Managing Partner, Cocoon Capital) — just to name a few.
After sitting through a total of 43 pitches, the panel carefully deliberated and reached a consensus for the top 5 teams of SWSG Mega 2018.
Presenting to you, our winning teams!
First Place: MindPalace
Second Place: Outspoken
Third Place: TongForChange
Most Creative: Mucho
Most Impactful: Hear to Learn
To provide our participants with support post event, The Start Pre-Accelerator, powered by Startup X, has opened their applications to the teams that have just come out of SWSG, as well as all early-stage startups. Interested teams coming out of the hackathon are given the opportunity to continue working on their ideas with the support provided by the programme.
SWSG Mega 2018 would not have been possible without every single one of you — judges, mentors, guests, participants, organizers and volunteers! We look forward to seeing some familiar faces at our next SWSG but until then, we want to wish the best to all the teams who have graduated from our hackathon! Stay hustling 💪🏼
