At the end of Week 1 of the fourth On Deck Fellowship cohort, we hosted a weekend hackathon to get Fellows collaborating and shipping projects together.

We had three prize categories:

• Most Achieved
• Most Creative
• Most Impact

Winner: Most Achieved

Duka: Shopify for Africa 🌍 [Demo Link]

Team: Aashni Shah, Mickey Costa, Alexis Haebin Kim, Jeff Christian

Duka is Shopify for Africa, the easiest way for small businesses to set up and manage their online stores.

E-commerce in Africa is an $18B market but creating an online store in Africa is still extremely difficult. Credit card-based payments don't work in Africa's cash-based economy, there are no affordable store setup services like Shopify/SquareSpace, and online scams are a huge issue. Duka solves the biggest pain points as the Shopify for Africa: a one-click solution for accepting mobile currency (MPesa integration, an SMS-based Venmo popular in Kenya), price and inventory management, and customer reviews/certification systems

Winner: Most Creative

Open Kitchen: Video Resumes for Restaurants 🍽️ [Project Link]

Team: Alvaro Anspach, Adaobi Kanu, Nick Venturino, Aatash Parikh

Open Kitchen is replacing the traditional resumé screen by creating a video-driven job marketplace for hospitality employers & workers.

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Winner: Most Impact

Clever Cow: Intelligent Pasture Management 🐮 [Project Screenshot]

Team: Jason Yosinski, Pujaa Rajan, Catriona Carey, Nivi Jayasekar, David Lobo

Managing ranch land using Rotational Grazing — where livestock are intentionally cycled through pastures to keep grass healthy — holds promise to increase yield and decrease irrigation costs for ranchers. Healthy grass also sequesters carbon in soil, combatting global warming. Clever Cow is a dashboard that uses satellite data to measure per-pasture grass health and drive daily rancher decisions.

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We had many incredibly impressive projects outside of those mentioned above, and we’re excited to see them launch over the coming weeks!

On Deck is a community of hundreds of talented people in tech who are all going through career transitions, and exploring their next move. We run a 10-week Fellowship cohort where we create an environment for knowledge sharing, support, community, and collaboration.

Want in? Our next cohort starts in August 2020. Applications now open!

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