Last week, we had the pleasure to analyze and vote together for the best solutions prototypes, worked out by the students in mathematics and informatics department from the Babeș –Bolyai University in Cluj-Napoca, during the TEDIHT Hackathon – Solutions for the Digitalization of Public Sector. Thirteen teams successfully finished their trimestrial projects and were happy to present the outcome in front of a pretty large audience.
Recap of the Initial Challenges
Starting in february, all the students received a specific challenge to solve and a mentor to work with. The topics proposed by the public sector beneficiaries were:
- Smart helpdesk for public institution employees – challenge owner: INCDTIM – National Research and Development Institute for Isotopic and Molecular Technologies
- Smart system for document inspection and archiving – challenge owner UTCN – The Technical Univeristy from Cluj-Napoca
- Smart system for managing and monitoring parking permits – UBB – Babeș-Bolyai Univeristy from Cluj-Napoca
The Jury
At this final stage the jury was formed by a experts from academia, the IT cluster and IT companies.
- Andrei Martiniuc – Project Manager, Transilvania IT
- Oana Raita – Senior researcher II at INCDTIM – National Research and Development Institute for Isotopic and Molecular Technologies and Executive Manager at Transylvania Energy Cluster
- Dan Mircea Suciu, PhD – Department of Computer Science, Faculty of Mathematics and Computer Science, Babeș-Bolyai University
- Diana Roșca – Marketing Manager, SOFTECH │Codespring
- Nicu Urs – Associate Dean and Associate Professor, Ph.D. – FAculty of Political, Administrative, and Communication Sciences, Babeș-Bolyai University
- Radu Slavescu – Associate Professor at the Technical University of Cluj-Napoca, Department of Computer Science, Intelligent Systems Group
For diversity purposes, the organizers also invited peer students from the audience to vote for the prezented solutions during Demo Day on April 30.
Constrasting Worlds: Public Administration Reality Versus Expected
The event took place in the large conference room at ABC Incubator and was seamlessly coordinated by TEDIHT team who kept the timing under control. As the teams started to present their projects, the reality hit hard.
Some teams managed to realistically investigate the actual situation of target public services: the citizen facing service departments, the document handling and the parking administration. Other teams chose to imagine how it should ideally work and started prototyping from those premises. This is when the distance from the public sector realities and the perceptions of the younger generation was most obvious. The distinctive situation from urban environments versus peri-urban and rural adminsitartive institutions is les likely to be approached in the same way given the fact that there are: different infrastructures, different hardware capacities and different technical skills. The students that managed to detect these differences and integrate adaptive approaches were the most liked and voted by everyone, both jury and colleagues.
Each Project Featured AI Powered Solutions
Already a norm among student projects, the usage of AI based platforms and tools was present in the solution designed by each of the competing teams. We were presented with integrated AI chatbots and virtual assistants, automated task management, AI-driven traffic management and predictive analytics. A great deal was the detection of possible fraudulent documents and identity theft. These are legit concerns formulated by the questioned employees in the public administration departments.
What all solutions seemed to lack, was the understanding of the human and financial efforts to test, implement and scale the prototypes. This is a pain point where academia is required to partner with private companies in order to achieve realistic scenarios and show their tech students how to connect to the surrounding realities.
The Winners
- Smart Helpdesk – Powerpuff Team, mentored by Wolfpack Digital representative
- Smart Document Management and Archving – CTR+WIN Team, mentored by Evozon representatives
- Smart Parking System – Lord of the Pings Team, mentored by +PlusWerk representatives
Beyond the results, what matters most is the collaboration between public administration, academia, and businesses, as well as the fact that the work was based on our local scenarios and that the solutions developed can actually be considered to be implemented after expert reviewing and fine-tuning.
SOFTECH’s Engagement
As a constant partner for the local universities and their informatics and computer engineering departments, of Transilvania IT cluster and of The European Innovation Hub in Transilvania, SOFTECH was happy to provide business mentorship and prizes to the winning teams!
Each team benefited of customized marketing guidance offered by our Marketing Manager, resulting in some really nice pitches and prototyped presentations. The winners will enjoy a unique team experience at the biggest adventure park in Cluj: Adrenalin Park. What a great way to celebrate three month of extra-curricular work!
About The TEDIHT Project
𝑇𝑟𝑎𝑛𝑠𝑖𝑙𝑣𝑎𝑛𝑖𝑎 𝐷𝑖𝑔𝑖𝑡𝑎𝑙 𝐼𝑛𝑛𝑜𝑣 𝑎𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛 𝐻𝑢𝑏 (Code 101083508 TDJH, DJALT-2021-EDU-01) Project –co-financed by the European Commission within the Digital Europe Programme through the Intelligent Growth, Digitalization and Financial Instruments 2021-2027.
Applause and Thank You Note
Congratulations to the partners and sponsors – SOFTECH software development and Tiny ERP, to the mentors and coordinating professors for their dedication, to the students for their hard work, and the representatives of the public institutions—beneficiaries of TEDIHT Call 4—for their involvement and support!