*The Hackathon “Restart for female digital starters“, part of the Erasmus+ Move It Forward+ project, took place on Saturday, November 13th 2021 at the Technoport SA in Belval.
Move it Forward+ is an Erasmus+ project that aims to support women who want to be entrepreneurs. Indeed, women’s entrepreneurship has been hit hard by the pandemic and this collaborative event is an excellent opportunity to launch new business ideas in the context of economic recovery. Four similar Hackathons are currently being organised in Europe by our partners: France, Belgium, Romania, Croatia and Lithuania.
All day long, thirty participants and volunteer coaches worked together to develop the different ideas. Business Model Canvas, market research or UX Design: the project leaders were able to benefit from the expertise and support of their peers to take their ideas to the next level.
After a presentation of the Move It Forward+ project and pitching of ideas, the work began, with six projects. Between a few cups of coffee and a piece of fruit, everyone gave their best, all in a studious and productive atmosphere.
The lunch break was an opportunity to recharge the batteries and to exchange with the whole group.
“The presence of the qualified coaches at the event gave me courage to pitch my idea and helped me build confidence to consider entrepreneurship as a career option.”, said one of the participants.
In the afternoon, the work continued and each project progressed at its own pace. At the end of the afternoon, it was time to wrap up the projects and prepare the pitches.
Three projects were rewarded with a jury composed of Nizar Ayed, Anne-Claire Buléon and Guylaine Bouquet:
- Best pitch: “Friendly Advice”, which aims to help students and newcomers solve their problems of settling in Luxembourg thanks to student volunteers and good samaritans who seek to build community and help newcomers and other young people better integrate into Luxembourg by offering their advice.”
- Best innovative project: “Femart Gallery”, which is a web gallery platform where female artists can share and sell creations to increase their visibility in the digital world with non-fungible tokens (NFTs).
- Best impact project: “Childs Play”, which aims to create a safe discussion platform among young children to educate them regarding the better use of social media.
Our winners of the day will therefore have the opportunity to follow a four-month personalised mentoring programme in order to make their projects a reality.
It is unanimous that this Hackathon was a success, and was beneficial for both the participants and their coaches, and we hope that these collaborations will bring new perspectives.
Congratulations to all our participants for their involvement, their motivation and their work during this day, congratulations to our coaches who were very professional and caring, and thanks to our jury, the choice of the winners was not easy!
This article originally appeared on MIF+ partner WIDE‘s website.
Sasha is founder of both the European Centre for Women and Technology and the Bulgarian Centre of Women in Technology, having launched the latter at end 2012. During her career as a global executive for Hewlett-Packard, Sasha succeeded in attracting key investment in the ICT sector in Bulgaria that resulted in thousands of new digital jobs. She is responsible for launching and actively contributing to a multitude of outreach activities that aim to inspire girls and women to pursue digital careers in Bulgaria and beyond.
14-year-old Amy has been coding for three years and has inspired people of all ages with her keynote speeches at the Raspberry Jamboree, Campus Party EU and Wired: Next Generation. She teaches older pupils how to code during her school lunch breaks and with the Manchester Girl Geeks.
Lune develops her own games and interactive movies with 
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