Hackathons

We welcome and value your participation in developing innovative solutions to various challenges. Using open government data and analysis, you will be able to share expertise in a wide range of fields, contribute to the digital transformation process, and develop new, creative ideas that support the Kingdom’s sustainable development goals while keeping abreast of global trends.

2024

• DevFest Bahrain 2024 - Tech Olympiad ^New

• The DevFest Bahrain 2024 is a global event organized by Google developers. The two-day event celebrates technology and innovation, and brings together tech enthusiasts, innovators, and professionals for a celebration of learning and collaboration. Participants in the event are given 24 hours to find innovative solutions for challenges with 5 diverse tasks.

• Year: 2024
• Period: 15^th - 16^th November 2024
• Target Audience: University students, tech enthusiasts, innovators, and professionals.
• Goal: This event aims to foster innovation and advance technical skills among Bahraini youth, providing a platform to showcase local talents and facilitate collaboration between developers, academics, and industry leaders.
• Organizers: Google, and the Information & eGovernment Authority as an official partner, with Zain Bahrain and the BIBF.
• Website: DevFest 2024
• Results: View the challenges winners on 'GDG Manama' Instagram account.

• Sustainability Hackathon

• The Sustainability Hackathon is an innovative event empowering university student to innovate, and develop creative solutions to address Bahrain’s sustainability challenges, for a sustainable future. 

• Year: 2024
• Period: October 2024
• Target Audience: University students.
• Goal: Develop creative solutions to address Bahrain’s sustainability challenges.
• Organizers:   Bahrain Islamic Bank (BisB) and The Supreme Council for Environment in partnership with INJAZ Bahrain.
• Website: Visit the Sustainability Hackathon  - BisB page.
• Results: Report on the closing of the Sustainability Hackathon  - BisB 

• Bahrain / Arab IOT & AI Challenge - 3rd Edition

• The University of Bahrain annually hosts (for three consecutive years) one of the most important competitions that encourage the use of modern technologies and the adoption of innovation and creativity that enhance the role of community members, especially the Bahraini youth, in supporting the national development process. Through this hackathon, the University of Bahrain seeks to achieve its strategic vision in the field of artificial intelligence, localizing technology, enhancing development and innovation in the fields of the Internet of Things, and providing qualified local cadres to contribute to the rapid growth in the Kingdom of Bahrain.

• Year: 2024
• Period: September - October 2024
• Target Audience: University students, startups, and people interested in innovation in the field of technology, the Internet of Things, and artificial intelligence applications.
• Goal: To embrace and promote innovative ideas in the fields of Internet of Things, artificial intelligence, and related technologies. The program encourages university students and startups to participate by submitting high-quality projects that contribute to improving current industries and driving the digital transformation process in Kingdom of Bahrain and the Arab world.
• Organizers: The University of Bahrain
• Website:  Bahrain / Arab IOT & AI Challenge
• Results: The "Headset-Free Location-Based AR Experience" project won first place in the graduation projects category. The project is an augmented reality experience designed to enhance physical activity and social interaction by providing an immersive experience in augmented reality directly through smartphones, eliminating the need for expensive headsets. The project aims to make augmented reality easier while encouraging movement and social communication.

• Space Apps Challenge

• The 2024 NASA Space Apps Challenge theme is “The Sun Touches Everything” in collaboration with NASA Heliophysics. This theme is in alignment with the Heliophysics Big Year, a global celebration of the Sun’s influence on Earth and the entire solar system, as declared by NASA.

• Year: 2024
• Period: 5^th – 6^th October 2024
• Target Audience: Anyone who is interested in space and technology.
• Goal: Tackle real-world problems on Earth and in space using NASA’s free and open data.
• Organizers: National Space Science Agency (NSSA) in collaboration with NASA. 
• Website: Visit the Space Apps Challenge page on NSSA website. 

• Benefit Advanced AI lab Hackathon

• The Benefit AI Hackathon encourages talented students to apply Artificial Intelligence, Data Science, and Machine Learning technologies to find innovative solutions to problems in the Kingdom of Bahrain. The contest is sponsored by the Benefit Bahrain Company and is organized by the College of IT at the University of Bahrain. 

• Year: 2024
• Period: 5^th – 8^th February 2024
• Target Audience: All Bahrain undergraduates (in their 3rd or 4th BSc year) and postgraduate university students. This year, students from University of Bahrain, Kingdom University, Ahila University, and Applied Science University are participating.
• Goal: To utilize innovative AI techniques & methods to solve problems and build skills in AI among university students in the Kingdom of Bahrain and improve current practices. Students will build projects using the Benefit AI High Performance Computing cluster at the College.
• Organizers: Benefit company, and the University of Bahrain.

• Generative AI Hackathon

• Students formed teams to ideate, innovate, and develop web applications utilizing Generative AI. Over the course of three days, students were presented with a unique platform to collaborate, receive mentorship from industry experts, and turn their visionary ideas into tangible projects.

• Year: 2024
• Period: January 2024
• Target Audience: University students.
• Goal: Aim of equipping participants with the skills and knowledge needed to harness the potential of this groundbreaking technology. The AI Generative Hackathon included insightful training workshops about Generative AI and its diverse applications within the educational landscape, and hands-on training on AWS services for building generative AI models.
• Organizers: American University of Bahrain, Al Salam Bank, Amazon Web Services.
• Website: aubh.edu.bh

2023

• Space Applications Hackathon Challenge

• A global hackathon organized by the National Space Science Authority (NSSA) and the United States National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). The hackathon provides participants from around the world with the opportunity to use open space data to develop technological solutions (applications, games, or innovative technological solutions) to challenges faced by the space industry. 

• Year: 2023
• Period: 7^th – 8^th October 2023
• Target Audience: Anyone who is interested in space and technology
• Goal: Increasing awareness among community members about the space sector and its importance and working towards organizing and developing the national space sector to contribute to supporting the economy and creating a sustainable national space industry.
• Organizers: National Space Science Agency (NAAS), University of Bahrain (UOB), Bahrain Polytechnic, Bahrain Society of Engineers.
• Website: Visit the official Space Applications Hackathon Challenge for more information and to register as a participant in the hackathon

• Bahrain IoT & AI Challenge

• A national program that aims to incubate ideas and build different capabilities of university students and startups that have innovative ideas in the areas of the Internet of Things (IoT), artificial intelligence (AI) and other related fields. This event is part of a regional program known as the "Arab Challenge", in which representatives from 13 Arab countries, in addition to the Kingdom of Bahrain, will participate in its second edition this year.

• Year: 2023
• Period: 16^th  October, 2023 – 20^th  October, 2023
• Target Audience: University students and Startups.
• Goal: The Challenge aims to adopt and enhance innovative ideas in the fields of IoT, AI and related technologies, in line with the strategic goals of the University and the economic vision of Bahrain 2030.
• Organizers: University of Bahrain, Bahrain IoT & AI Challenge.
• Website: Visit the official Arab IoT & AI Challenge for more information and to register as a participant in the hackathon.

• The 2023 SDMX Hackathon

• Whether you're a budding developer, a seasoned tech wizard, or an aspiring statistician, we invite you to be part of this exciting opportunity to provide innovative solutions for actual official statistics use cases.
  Join us in developing an open-source web application that will empower the creation of customized data dashboards, integrating data from SDMX APIs. The open-source nature of the dashboard generator will foster collaboration, customization, and community contributions, driving continuous improvement and innovation.
  If you wish to participate, please send an email to sdmx2023@sdmx.org with the subject “SDMX 2023 Hackathon” expressing your willingness to participate including your name and organization details.

• Year: 2023
• Period: 29 – 30, September 2023
• Target Audience: The SDMX Hackathon is open to everyone, regardless of their experience.
• Goal: This hackathon aims to nurture and develop the creative talents of young people who are interested in artificial intelligence (AI). It will test their ability to create innovative projects that use one or more of the features of Microsoft Azure for AI, through developing an innovative open-source solution with dynamic data retrieval dashboards for real official statistics use cases.
• Organizers: SDMX Sponsors, and the Information & eGovernment Authority.
• Website: Visit the official SDMX Hackathon for more information and to register as a participant in the hackathon.

• Khalid bin Hamad Competition for Innovation in Artificial Intelligence, HackFest
• The fourth annual Khalid bin Hamad Competition for Innovation in Artificial Intelligence, HackFest 2023 was an event that brought together participants from all public and private schools and universities to encourage innovation in artificial intelligence.
• Year: 2023
• Period: 7 – 13, May 2023
• Goal: This competition aims to incubate and develop young creative talents interested in artificial intelligence and test their ability to create innovative projects that use one or more Microsoft Azure artificial intelligence (AI) features.
• Organizers: Bahrain Polytechnic, Information & eGovernment Authority, Microsoft, Almoayyed Computers Middle East (ACME)
• Website: https://hackfest.polytechnic.bh

• Hackathon on Internationalized Domain Names (.BH) in Arabic
• This hackathon that brought together local university students from various disciplines to innovate and implement technologies that support internationalized domain names (IDN) in Arabic covered the technical requirements necessary to establish a sustainable and multilingual Internet environment. Participants developed software with universal acceptance, configured email systems to support initiatives of internationalization of email addresses (EAI), and tried to publish email names in Arabic.
• Year: 2023
• Period: 15 – 17, February 2023
• Goal: Training and empowering youth to develop the internationalized domain name for the Kingdom of Bahrain, and increasing community awareness about the availability of rich online content in several languages
• Organizers: The Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (TRA), Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN).
• Source

• The Green Youth Hackathon: “Sustainability and Climate Change”
• A hackathon featuring entrepreneurs, SDG experts, sociologists, and youth from Bahrain interested in sustainability to support innovative, creative and effective sustainable development projects in Bahrain.
• Year: 2023
• Period: 25 April – 10 May 2023
• Goal: Support and develop economically sustainable projects that promote SDGs 12 and 13
• Organizers: Youth Riadah Association, French Embassy in Manama, Bahrain Science Centre
• Source

2022

• NASA SPACE APPS 2022 “MAKE SPACE” Hackathon
• The NASA SPACE APPS 2022 “MAKE SPACE” Hackathon included participants from high schools and public and private universities. It aimed to discover new findings and promote the sharing of non-traditional ideas using virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR), to review and simulate data, and by using advanced technologies.
• Year: 2022
• Period: 3 – 4 October 2022
• Goal: Increase participants' understanding of NASA's problems on specific issues and inspire them to identify solutions and create applications that have not yet been developed.
• Organizers: National Space Science Agency (NSSA), Bahrain Polytechnic, Bahrain Society of Engineers.
• Source

• Open Banking Hackathon
• The hackathon included competitions from "Bahrain Supernova for Financial Technology" 2022, entitled “Open Banking Hackathon” to promote innovation in the financial services sector.
• Year: 2022
• Period: 12 October 2022
• Goal: Providing cutting-edge insight into innovative technologies to enhance Bahrain's financial services sector while bridging the gap between fintech enthusiasts and businesses.
• Organizers: Central Bank of Bahrain, The Bahrain Supernova, Fintech Galaxy
• Source

2021

• Khalid bin Hamad Competition for Innovation in Artificial Intelligence, HackFest
• The third annual Khalid bin Hamad Competition for Innovation in Artificial Intelligence, HackFest 2021 brought together participants from public and private schools and universities to encourage innovation in artificial intelligence.
• Year: 2021
• Period: 19 – 21 February 2021
• Goal: Test participants' ability to create innovative projects using AI applications
• Organizers: Bahrain Polytechnic, Information & eGovernment Authority, Microsoft, Almoayyed Computers Middle East (ACME)

• Hackathon for innovative solutions for Post Corona Pandemic Recovery
• The aim of the Post-Pandemic Recovery Hackathon was to create innovative administrative solutions to overcome the 2021 crisis which rely on the foundations of scientific research, its methodologies, and best practices in order to combat the repercussions and effects of the Coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic and improve government efficiency.
• Year: 2021
• Period: June – 28 November 2021
• Goal: Measuring the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the level of performance of public sector employees in the Kingdom of Bahrain to propose solutions to the challenges of the pandemic
• Organizers: University of Bahrain, Bahrain Institute for Public Administration (BIPA), United Nations Development Program (UNDP).

• Student Climate Action Hackathon 2
• Launched annually by the Global Network of Technological Universities to address problems associated with the United Nations Climate Action Goals that support the Sustainable Development Goals. 
• Year: 2021
• Period: 18 – 21 October 2021
• Goal: Finding successful solutions by delivering global innovations and acquiring knowledge and analytical skills related to recycling and environmental conservation
• Organizers: Global Network of Universities

2019

• ​​​​"Competition and Innovation": Women's Hackathon 2019.
• The first Bahraini women's hackathon in 2019, aimed at discovering the talents of Bahraini women and enhancing their professional capabilities in the digital field according to the best international standards.
• Year: 2019.
• Period: October 15, 2019 - October 17, 2019.
• Goal: Creating practices that guarantee self- and professional development and raising women’s abilit to continue teaching and learning. Providing education on what the field of future sciences provides in terms of opportunities, options and plans to expand their work circle and investing in available opportunities.
• Organizers: Bahrain Polytechnic, Supreme Council for Women, Brinc-Batelco.

2017

• "Hackathon" youth category competition
• Due to its advanced information and communication technology (ICT) infrastructure, and the talent of its youth, Bahrain was selected from out of 9 countries to be the only Arab country to host this event.
• Year: 2017.
• Period: March 9, 2017 - March 11, 2017.
• Goal: Engaging youth in creating and developing projects that focus on innovation and will have a positive impact on Bahrain and the world, and focusing on goal nine related to industry, innovation, and infrastructure under the Sustainable Development Goals 2030.
• Organizers: United Nations Development Programme.