More than 240 software developers, designers, engineers, bizdevs, marketers and other professionals took part in the Hacker Games: Vilnius hackathon at Vilnius Tech Park last weekend. A total of 45 projects across 4 tracks were pitched in the finals, including innovations such as Understraight smart posture coach/bra extension, a Field engineer work optimization system, a smart cigarette pack holder, and a dozen of games.

Let’s have a quick look at the winning projects and ideas that the jury and the audience found of interest.

Understraight, a smart posture coach and a bra extension, was announced as the winner of the Hardware track. The device can be worn with any bra. An accelerometer notifies the wearer about a wrong posture by vibrating and by pushing notifications to an app that also analyses posture patterns. This device could cost up to 49 EUR in the retail retail market. Understraight team was awarded with a 3 month-long membership at VGTU’s LinkMenų fabrikas.

Team Dark I were recognized as the best engineers at the Hardware track, they received a Deeper PRO+ smart sonar from Deeper. This team made a game controller consisting of a board players can stand on, and a gun. Deeper’s CTO Donatas Malinauskas said we was excited to see so much technical talent that was able to take their ideas far into being fully working prototypes. “We create and build our smart fishfinders here in Lithuania, so we truly wish to see as much as possible hardware being made here by people who live and share their knowledge here,” D. Malinauskas said.

Also, a team from Visaginas made a smart cigarette pack case that both counts the cigarettes one smokes and offers a smoking cessation plan in a connected app. Also, a USB-killer and other projects were also introduced at the Hardware track.

These Hacker Games had a novelty – a Smart Energy track set by Lietuvos Energija, a major Lithuanian energy group that also focuses on energy innovations with its 5M EUR VC fund set to launch next year. They offered 1K EUR in cash for the winners, and so the Smart Energy track had 10 projects pitched at the finals.

Field engineer work and route optimization system by the Autostrada Vilnius-Kaunas was announced as the winners of this track. This team suggests that millions of euros are wasted at utility, energy and telco companies by planning the routes of their engineers manually. For this reason, they created a work planning tool and an app that offers most logical routes for engineers and has features such as quick client contact information, task planner, navigation, time tracker and adding extra data, to name a few.

Also, a special prize set by the Sunrise Valley – a membership at its co-working centre and a fast-track ticket to its Futurepreneurs programme – was awarded to the Eating Phone team that made an educational 3D game for kids that simulates cities, energy production and offers better/interactive ways to understand how the energy is made and used.

Team LightUP was promised a dinner with the managers of “Manogile.lt” platform as their donation plugin/solution that translates money donated into kilowatts saved/used could be of value to this portal. Also, solutions such as smart and energy saving pedestrian crossing, peak energy demand balancer, LED screen recycling into lighting project and a VR simulator for energy plant operators were introduced in the finals.

“I’m excited to see so many viable projects being made at the Smart Energy track. All these ideas are interesting and could be used in practice. Also, our mentors got value knowledge whilst working with the participants and I hope they got some from us too. This hackathon proves there’s lots of engineering and problem solving-oriented potential among the Lithuanian youth, and we how that our Innovation fund that will invest in early stage energy startups will benefit from this potential,” Dominykas Tuckus, Lietuvos Energija’s board member and Director of Production and Services said.

Software track had 15 entries. Team Chocolate Bar and their LUDO indoor navigation app won 500 EUR from StartupHighway, and the Išnarpliok tool to teach kids programming at schools won 500 EUR in cash from SpectroCoin. Also, GetPrice, a price crawler for e-commerce, won a membership at Vilnius Tech Park’s co-working centre and, most importantly, in-depth mentoring by CSC Baltic’s web, app and business development professionals.

“Hacker Games was a great opportunity for CSC corporation to find mutual points of interest with Lithuania’s startup ecosystem. This fits well into our long-lasting partnership with Lithuanian schools and universities. We are interested in Lithuanian startup community as we wish to know what is of its interest. This allows us to have a new look at the IT market and to pursue its sustainable development”, Antanas Uršulis, CSC Baltic’s CEO, said. CSC Baltic was the main contributor to the success of Hacker Games: Vilnius and the thank them for both their support and huge input by their mentors.

Team Startup Lithuania and Enterprise Lithuania also thanks 240+ attendees from all across Lithuania and also Belarus, Canada, Iran, Mexico, Sweden, Turkey and other countries. Great job guys!

Hacker Games could not happen without our friends and partners: CSC Baltic, VGTU LinkMenų Fabrikas, Startup Highway, Game Insight, Lietuvos energija, TransferGo, Deeper, Vilnius Tech Park, Copictures, Unity, SpectroCoin, Technarium, Sunrise Valley and others. Thanks so much guys!