BU x Berkeley SkyDeck Fund Hackathon: The 2nd Edition, 2024

The competition consists of a preliminary round, where participants must submit a provisional business project online via a 5-minute video clip, and a final round, which is a 2-day hackathon at Bangkok University. In the final round, participants will refine and present their complete business project using a PowerPoint format, covering pain points, business solutions, and business and financial models.

The competition and application period begins on February 15, 2024, with an extended deadline to February 22. The results will be announced on February 29.

The finalists will receive two days of training on March 28-29. 

The announcement and award ceremony will take place on 29 March 2024. 

The prizes for the finalists include a cash prize of 100,000 Baht and a certificate for the first-place winner, a cash prize of 80,000 Baht and a certificate for the second-place winner, a cash prize of 50,000 Baht and a certificate for the third-place winner, and four special prizes, each receiving a cash prize of 10,000 Baht along with a certificate.

Objectives: 

• To enhance essential skills for university students' business projects/innovation development programmes.

• To foster collaboration between students, startups, and venture capitalists (VCs) in Thailand. 

• To promote international cooperation between students in Thailand and abroad, including the Berkeley SkyDeck Fund and others. 

Topic: Innovative Business Project 

Participants: 58 teams, over 230 participants from 23 universities across 7 countries.

The key takeaways regarding the success of this campaign are to enhance essential skills for business projects or innovation development and to create collaboration between students, startups, and venture capitalists (VCs) in Thailand. It also promotes collaboration between university students in Thailand and abroad, and the Berkeley SkyDeck Fund, including global partners.

The pitching results were:

First prize winning team: Glowco from Chulalongkorn University – Project name: "Painless home use cholesterol screening kit"

Second prize winning team: Workhard REPS from Petra Christian College – Project name: "Repurposed – Green Bin"

Third prize winning team: Surety from Singapore University of Social Sciences – Project name: "Surety Menopause Management"

Honorable Mention Awards 

- Team PEER Lab from Hosei University - Project name: “Pineapple Leather”

- Team Excel In Stone from Asian Institute of Technology – Project name: “Thirsty Concrete”

- Team UGBN from Bangkok University, Chiang Mai University, King Mongkut's Institute of ----Technology Ladkrabang, and King Mongkut's University of Technology Thonburi - Project name: “IoT-ULAP”

- Team League Apollo: Quick Tech from Bangkok University - Project name: “Innovative Business Idea”

Our collaboration with the Berkeley SkyDeck Fund 

The Berkeley SkyDeck Fund is an organisation established by the University of California, Berkeley, one of the world's top educational institutions, with extensive experience in advising numerous startups. 

Brian Bordley stated that normally the Berkeley SkyDeck Fund works closely with leading universities to provide knowledge and guidance on being a startup and to create an ecosystem conducive to success in the startup business path. Over the past five years, more than 200 startups from over 30 countries worldwide have joined us, raising funds in the business ranging from 200,000 to 1 million USD. What we teach is not just how to be a good startup, but we also have funding sources to help make startup businesses successful. 

“This is considered the beginning for Bangkok University in developing from a university with strengths in creating SME entrepreneurs to startups that can create new businesses impacting global social change and providing new services to consumers," said Asst. Prof.Supachet Chansar, Assistant to the President for Academic Affairs, Bangkok University, discussing the collaboration that led to this startup business competition. 
 

Creating a startup ecosystem

Brian stated that to create a successful startup ecosystem, the first component is having entrepreneurs with passion and a lot of energy for the business, willing to take risks. They do not necessarily have to be young. Middle-aged business people with the drive to start a business can also do so. 

The second component is mentors or advisors who provide various consultations to businesspeople. The entrepreneurs themselves must be open-minded, able to accept the truth, and ready to adapt. At the same time, mentors must be open to new ideas and analyse feasibility based on experience to provide accurate advice.

Lastly, it is the center of investors looking for interesting business ideas and investing in that startup. This is why the Berkeley SkyDeck Fund works with renowned universities capable of developing and training new startups to succeed while also providing investors or funding sources to help the startups succeed further.