Enable caring communities through relevant and timely match of volunteer request and participation

Hackathon@SG2015 was Singapore’s largest hackathon with more than 1,000 students, programmers, academia, designers and entrepreneurs ideate, code and co-create innovative solutions in areas such as City Planning, Public Services, Healthcare, Safety & Security, Urban Mobility and Urban Living.

Organised by the Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore, and IT Standards Committee and supported by the Ministry of Finance and SPRING Singapore, the event offered more than 11,000 datasets and brought together 18 ministries and agencies - 12 of which provided real-life challenge statements to improve Singapore urban environment and foster a greater sense of community spirit. Total of 320 submissions were received from the 4 different categories, Junior, Student, Open and HackMed.

The Brief

Hackathon@SG ‪2015 is possibly the largest hackathon ever held in Singapore with a turnout of over 1,100 from all walks of life such as healthcare professionals, entrepreneurs, programmers, designers and students. The competition is jointly organized by Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore and IT Standards Committee on 25-26 July‬ to tackle urban challenges impacting Singapore and participate in Smart Nation building efforts.

As one of the challenge sponsors, Singapore Land Authority (SLA) is seeking a geospatial-enabled platform or application to promote volunteerism and caring communities through sharing of geo-data. Driven by this needs, we are looking to address following questions:

• How might we enable more people participate in community volunteerism?
• How might we enable people in need to get timely and responsive help?

Idea: Project GrabHelp

Universal Community Volunteerism

Using SMS as Communication Platform, GrabHelp locates and connects those who needs help with nearby community of volunteers in near real-time. We simplify the process of requesting help via SMS just by using name, needs and location keyword. GrabHelp will then find available and notify nearby volunteers for acknowledgement. Upon consent from both parties, relevant contact details is then revealed.

Highlight Reel from UP Singapore.