Together against the virus: Dozens of employees participated in the hackathon "wirvsvirus" initiated by the German government. The result: Promising solutions in the fight against the corona virus, which are now being evaluated and tested for their suitability for implementation.
Corona hackathon "#wirvsvirus": Around 43,000 employees of large DAX companies such as Deutsche Telekom, as well as small German startups, took part in the world's largest hackathon over the weekend - virtually, from the comfort of their homes. The goal: Finding new ideas and solutions in the fight against the challenges and consequences of the corona pandemic. To this end, 800 so-called "challenges" were defined, which included, for example: helping contain the spread of the virus, protecting high-risk groups, providing support in crisis management for the economy, or strengthening solidarity and cohesion among the population.
Developers and coders, consultants, project managers and executives - despite the extremely short lead time, numerous employees spontaneously and across company boundaries agreed to put their weekend and expertise to good use.
Creative ideas for business and private purposes
A major focus was on the development of solutions for the healthcare sector. Results included, for example, support for the overworked health authority hotline staff. Routine enquiries are automated from all channels such as e-mail, telephone, SMS and SocialMedia, and are answered by a machine-learning back-office system. So that the employees again have time to deal with important individual questions in personal contact.
In addition to solutions for the healthcare sector, solutions to assist the self-employed and small and medium-sized enterprises have been developed as well. They have to apply for subsidies quickly, without too much bureaucracy, in order to ensure their survival.
To support the topic of “Social Distancing”, an app has been developed that helps people organize their daily routines within their own four walls at home. Or, for a gamification approach, with the „Stay@home“ app the best home stayer earns "karma points" in his home WLAN and in challenges, and measures himself with other people staying at home.
Jury and citizens decide on the best ideas
A jury will decide in the next few days which projects will be funded. In addition, every citizen can then choose at the “wirvsvirushackathon” website which project has impressed them the most.
"The hackathon has shown how powerful and imaginative our colleagues in the Deutsche Telekom Group are. Now it's up to us to implement the good ideas: “TelekomvsVirus," says Telekom employee Christoph Meyer-Delpho, who acted as mentor for the participants in the hackathon.
