RBC recently announced the winners of the 2017 ‘Next Great Innovator Hackathon.’
For the 10th anniversary of the event, RBC brought together over 130 students for a top prize of $10,000. In 33 hours, 35 teams from across 18 schools worked away to build an app that RBC could offer to help entrepreneurs start, manage and grow their businesses.
This year, however, the competition was so stiff that two teams tied for the second-place prize of $5,000 and for the fourth place prize of $2,000.
Team Sidekick from the University of Toronto, Western University and the University of Waterloo took home the gold.
“We’re always looking for fresh ideas to better serve our clients, and students bring innovative and creative thinking to the table to help us do that,” said Sumit Oberai, senior vice-president of digital development at RBC.
“They get the opportunity to solve real-life business challenges, while we get exposure to the latest technologies they’re using, so it’s a win-win.”
Competitor Alyssia Jovellanos and her team came in second place with their augmented reality app. Jovellanos is a computer science major at McMaster University and says that she enjoys participating to experiment with what she’s learned in class.
“Competing in hackathons like NGI gives me the chance to build something from scratch and test new ideas,” said Jovellanos in a statement.
“It’s just so cool to apply your knowledge and turn it into something completely different that will solve a problem or positively impact someone’s business.”
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