Participants in the 2023 Women in FinTech Hackathon have continued to show significant progress and commitment to using Financial Technology to transform their communities.
Day 4 kicked off with a detailed session on Open Source Software and Mojaloop Security, presented by Paul Baker, the Principle Product Manager of INFITX and member of the Mojaloop Community.
The Mojaloop Open Source session was then followed by the teams presenting their solutions and prototype designs. With examples, they illustrated their solutions’ customer journey and explained how they envisioned them to function.
“From the presented solution and prototype designs, it is evident that a lot of progress has been made by all the teams. Each team is now focusing on delivering a functional minimum viable product (MVP) by Thursday, 17th August,” Charlotte Neeza, the HiPipo FinTech Events Manager noted.
“Compared to last week, the Hackathon is now tense in a very good way as the innovators continue to build their products. Teams are time conscious as they are aware that it is mission critical for them to have their MVPs ready and submitted for a final assessment on Thursday.”
Away from the solutions and prototype design presentations, the participants interacted with two mentors who shared extensive knowledge on Financial Discipline, Investment and Product Management.
Prossy Namubiru, the Youth Supervisor, Retail & Microfinance Division at Centenary Bank, noted that Financial Discipline refers to how well you are able to conform your spending and saving to the plans that you have set to achieve your monetary goals.
“Discipline is a necessary skill for proper financial management. Without it, you will never acquire or accumulate anything. Without it you will never accomplish anything,” Namubiru said, adding;
“Financially, discipline is about controlling your spending and making sure you pay for the things that need to be paid for. If you cannot control your spending, then no matter how much money you make it will never be enough.”
Namubiru noted that Centenary Bank has multiple offerings for young people including youth-friendly accounts, free financial literacy sessions for organized youth groups and low-interest youth loans.
Meanwhile, Mercy Angela Nantongo, a product manager and an emerging media technologist, took the teams on a product management voyage. She explained that product management is a deliberate and continuous process that ensures that both the product owners and customers get the best value possible. She likened a product manager to the customer’s voice within an organization.
“A product manager is like the parent of a child. This is a role we can differentiate from other actors in the child’s life like the doctor that helped birth them, or the teachers that guide them over the course of their lives,” Nantongo said.
“Product managers collect all the problems about the product, segregate them and share them with the responsible people in the product eco-system for resolution. They also plan and execute solutions. While customer support deals with after-sales, product management works more with before-sales.”
She noted that some of the key traits of successful product managers are empathy, optimism, being analytical, strategic and result-oriented.
Running for the 4th consecutive year, the Women in FinTech Hackathon is part of the broader Women in Fintech initiative that also includes a Summit and Incubator program; all implemented by HiPipo in partnership with Level One Project, Mojaloop Foundation, INFITX, Cyberplc Academy, Crosslake Technologies and Ideation Corner and supported by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
The 2023 Women in FinTech Hackathon will culminate into the Women in FinTech summit on 18th August 2023 where the best-performing teams and individuals will be announced and receive their share of the USD 10,000 collective prize money. This will be in addition to the winners automatically qualifying for the Women in FinTech Incubator program that will run from September until December 2023.