This international scientific event on the Blue Economy organized by the Free Trade Zone begins tomorrow, Friday, and will bring together these 57 researchers throughout the weekend around 9 challenges that compete in the development of a prototype based on marine data and examine its uses and Applications
Participation in Cádiz is one of the highest in the competition since the average registration from the other 15 participating cities is around 30 registered.
The weekend-long program alternates research and team work with mentoring sessions for projects in areas such as business models, oceanography, computer development or intellectual property
The participating challenges address topics such as pollution and marine litter, blue tourism, blue education or saving fuel in navigation.
On Sunday afternoon the winner will be known who will compete representing Cádiz in the grand finale in Brest at the end of the year
In addition, the Consortium will reward all participating challenges with a free incubation period in its high-tech incubator Incubazul within the framework of the Base Zone project.
Participation in the Ocean Hackathon 2020 held by the Cádiz Free Trade Zone this weekend has reached 57 registrations, a figure that exceeds initial expectations and places Cádiz as one of the 16 competing cities with the most successful call, above from the average of the rest of the locations, which is around 30 registered.
With this success of participation, this international scientific event will begin tomorrow, Friday at 2:30 p.m., in which Cádiz will be the epicenter of Blue Economy research throughout the weekend. Thus, the fiscal precinct of the capital will host for 48 hours the 57 experts and scholars in the field of the oceans registered and who have joined one of the 9 challenges selected this summer and who compete to represent Cádiz in the final that will be held in Brest. All challenges were selected meeting criteria of connection with the sea, use and availability of data, innovation and originality, and ocean conservation.
In this way, Cádiz and simultaneously 15 other maritime cities in the world will become a ideation lab for the participating teams that will have to develop, through technology and different variables and scientific data, those proposals and challenges of greatest interest for the protection of the oceans, with the objective of creating tools for the improvement of the oceans.
The Event schedule It's going to be intense (here we attach it https://cutt.ly/XgrQhda) and will alternate teamwork sessions on the topics of the 9 challenges with sessions of mentoring with experts who will provide knowledge and added value to challenges in matters such as business models, oceanography, computer development or intellectual property. It must be remembered that the theme of the challenges ranges from the development of an app that allows evaluating the pollution of garbage in the sea or an app for blue tourism; the assessment of garbage in the sea through drones; the use of marine litter in the production of school supplies for blue education; or the development of a logarithm for fuel savings and pollution reduction on the maritime transport route, among others.
After the two days of work, on Sunday afternoon the winning challenge will be announced, which will obtain the possibility of competing representing Cádiz in the Brest final next December. Among the criteria for its designation, the environmental and social dimension, the business model, product quality and the use of data, among others, will be valued.
In addition, the Free Trade Zone will reward all participating challenges with a free incubation period in the high-tech incubator Incubazul that has been launched within the framework of the Base Zone project that will allow the maturation and business path of the ideas presented, being able to promote and boost their full potential around the Blue Economy.
In fact, the Ocean Hackathon® 2020 is the first internationalization action of this incubator that is subsidized with funds granted by the Spanish Feder 2014-2020 Pluriregional Operational Program “A way to make Europe” and managed by the Incyde Foundation.
It should be noted that together with the Consortium, the University of Cádiz (UCA) actively collaborates with the Ocean Hackathon 2020, also through the CEIMAR Campus of International Excellence of the Sea and the CEEI Bahía de Cádiz.
A program adapted to the special circumstances due to Covid
The Cádiz Free Zone as organizer of the Ocean Hackathon has proposed holding the event taking into account the special circumstances derived from the pandemic and has reinforced all Covid-19 measures to maintain the in-person nature of the teams due to the richness it brings to the research team dynamics and contact with mentors/experts, who will also be present along with members of the jury during the weekend to offer their services and see the evolution of the challenges.
In this context, the Consortium has enabled the central patio and rooms of the Melkart building; the assembly hall and exhibition hall of the Heracles building; and the central plaza between both buildings, all of them spacious and conditioned spaces and services so that participants from all groups can meet and develop their challenges in optimal conditions.
