An overnight success
It’s not often that you can write about an overnight success and mean it quite so literally – but the aspiring entrepreneurs who took part in Startup Hacks last weekend achieved an amazing amount in such a short time it’s not an exaggeration to state it like that (well ok, it was over 2 nights if you insist!).
Within a mere 48 hours, eight talented teams of individuals came together, formed ideas, developed business plans, and built MVP models. I don’t know what you got up to this weekend, but I’m pretty sure you can’t better that!
At the end of it all, the teams stood proud, pitched their businesses to an impressive judging panel (composed of venture capitalists, tech. journalists, and startup incubators), and walked away with cash prizes – not to mention a potential £15,000 investment!
Layershift were sponsoring the event, and I was lucky enough to have the opportunity to work directly with some of the teams as they put in the long hours to develop their ideas over such a short time. And no, that’s not an oxymoron; when you need to get so much done in just 48 hours, long hours are definitely involved along the way as the now-exhausted, sleep deprived, participants can more than attest to!
Teams Edugotcha and Event Catch both availed themselves of the free Layershift Jelastic Cloud hosting generously provided throughout the weekend, and needless to say they were not disappointed with their platform choice.
Edugotcha present to the judges at the end of an exhausting weekend
Thanks to Jelastic, Edugotcha were able to re-code their entire application multiple times as the business requirements for their startup evolved throughout the weekend. The time saved by not needing to redeploy / reimage server environments within that process ultimately made the difference that allowed them to deliver a working MVP in time for their pitch.
Left: Event Catch present their business to the judging panel. Right: A brief look at their rather nicely polished looking application – amazing what you can do in just 48 hours!
Event Catch combined the perfect blend of front end design with backend development to deliver a visually stunning application with real functional purpose. I am still genuinely shocked at just how polished their application after (less than) 48 hours development! I guess they even surprised themselves – here’s the designer’s take:
“Massive thanks to @Layershift for their servers and and assistance. Felt very powerful to be able to produce an accessible site so quickly.”
The fact these teams could deliver so much so quickly is a testament in part to the time the Jelastic platform saved them. It emphasises the benefits of being able to remain completely focussed on the business / application instead of getting caught up in server admin. configuration / troubleshooting headaches (something that delayed and distracted another team who’d opted to run and develop their application locally instead), but in all honesty the platform is just a facilitator – everything achieved by every single one of the guys and girls at Startup Hacks in Manchester over the weekend was a result of good old fashioned hard work.
The papers are often quick to point out that concept is lost on today’s students and graduates – I’m pleased to know eight dedicated teams providing solid proof that misconception is so very very wrong.
Congratulations to every single person who took part; you made Startup Hacks event such a resounding success, and a special thanks is reserved once again for the organisers for allowing us to be an integral part of their weekend!
Note: I’ve deliberately omitted technical and business details of their ideas from this post in case any of the participants wish to progress them to the next level; it’d be unfair to divulge their trade-secrets!