Talanx holds its own hackathon to drive digitalisation

120 participants, 30 hours, 45,000 GB of data – just three of the key numbers to come out of Hack{IT}over, the hackathon held by the Talanx Group and one of the largest events of its kind in the German insurance industry. Some 40 students and 80 seasoned professionals in ages ranging from 18 to 57 assembled on the last weekend in April to work intensively on software solutions for the areas of speech recognition, the workplace of the future and mobility. The event was supported by numerous partners and sponsors, including SAP, VW Financial Services and Precire, who made technology interfaces and anonymised data available to the participants for the realisation of their ideas. Cash prizes of between EUR 2,500 and EUR 10,000 were handed out along with non-cash and other special prizes.

The goal of the hackathon was "to become quicker and more customer-focused", as Torsten Leue, a member of the Board of Management of Talanx AG and Chief Executive Officer of Talanx International AG, explained. Innovative ideas for the insurance industry, contacts with highly talented individuals and agile project work were therefore very much front and centre at the event.

The 24 interdisciplinary teams with top talents from the fields of business, mathematics and computer science as well as engineers and UX/UI designers from Germany and the Netherlands created an inspiring and creative "can do atmosphere" in the atrium of the Talanx headquarters. "I got an hour's sleep. I'm not at all tired, quite the opposite. I feel full of energy", Felix Hanos, a software engineer from Hannover, commented. He had grabbed a nap on one of the 35 camp beds set out in the insurer's sports hall.

Ultimately, three solutions stood out to the jury. First place went to the "Telli" group for its interactive technology that makes legally compliant documents easy to understand for end customers. The second spot went to team "Seraphim", which developed a solution for matching customers with suitable insurance advisers. Third place was awarded to the "InsurMe" team for automated claims management via Chatbot in the automobile sector.

Working together with the event partners, Talanx intends to provide follow-up support for selected teams in order to refine the existing ideas – including, for example, in Talanx's own Digital Lab.

It was great. Look here!

Talanx HackITOver 2018 official (Youtube)

Further information can be found on the event website www.hackitover.com. Please visit the media library to see more photos as well as impressions of the event captured in a drone video.