Innovators recently took part in a 48-hour AI Hackathon, giving 15 teams the chance to develop AI-powered solutions to real life challenges.
This marked Digital Jersey’s third weekend-long hackathon focused on AI, following a similar event held last year and a ‘Junior Hackathon’ for young innovators earlier this year.
A mix of developers, designers, entrepreneurs and first-timers met on Friday night and formed teams with the aim of designing an AI solution to solve a challenge faced in Jersey.
There was a £10,000 prize on the line for the winning team.
The brief was left open this time, giving participants the freedom to explore any issue Jersey faces – ranging from healthcare and financial services to the visitor economy.
Industry mentors supported the teams throughout the weekend and they were provided with access to open data sets to help their project development.
The teams then presented their creations to an expert judging panel on Sunday.
Projects covered issues including OECD Common Reporting Standards, financial advice, recruitment, traffic planning and support for disabled visitors.
Maria Madalyna’s Anlgma project was named the overall winner for developing a supply chain management platform for pharmacies, helping to predict medicine shortages and ensuring Jersey patients can continue to access treatment.
Two other projects were recognised in special categories.
JerriAI, a friendly AI language partner helping islanders learn and practice Jersey’s endangered Jèrriais language created by Charlie Morgan won the Best Working Prototype award.
And Mark McNally, who developed CodeRock, a simulator of potential futures for Jersey which uses AI to identify solutions to future challenges, won Most Innovative Use of AI.
Charlie Miles, innovation manager at Digital Jersey, said: “Our latest AI Hackathon brought together a broad spectrum of people, all looking to make a difference to our island using AI. It was inspiring to see so many great ideas go from concept to prototype over just 48 hours.
“The projects demonstrated that AI doesn’t provide the ideas; people do. Technology now gives local talent the ability to turn their knowledge and creativity into practical solutions that tackle real challenges and help shape the island’s future. Well done to all involved.”
