Standard Bank Technology Impact Challenge 2024
Taking the Technology Impact Challenge
At Standard Bank, we use the latest technologies to grow and maintain client experience, and to ensure we are growing Africa. Think your technology skills match up? If you have what it takes to succeed in the Standard Bank Impact Challenge, you could be on your way to jumpstarting a technology career and making an impact on real-world problems and lives.
Banking no longer has the stereotypical image of bland and simple systems. Our biggest competitors are technology companies providing financial services, such as fintechs. We need to stay ahead of the curve by exploring and adopting new technologies so that we can provide our customers with universal products and services. We hope to give you, the students, an opportunity to think about societal problems in the real world and come up with solutions using an emerging and exponential technology.
This year, we will be looking at the exciting and disruptive technology called BlockChain. So show us what you’ve got!
Test yourself
Our Tech Impact Challenge tests your technical, problem-solving, creative and teamwork skills. The format of the Technology Impact Challenge is as follows:
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- Heats
Working in a team of up to four, you will tackle a series of hypothetical problems within a set time. The questions will vary in difficulty and some will require blockchain knowledge.
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- Finals
The finals are broken down into two phases that will really test your skills:
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- a. HashBlock – this phase is similar to the heats format. Your team of four will be given a number of problems (commonly faced by the bank) that should be solved by means of blockchain. These problems are binary and are either right or wrong.
- b. IdeaChain – this phase will test your creative and teamwork skills. Teams of six will be formed, and the objective is for them to develop a prototype application for a problem that will be announced during an unconference at the finals. The prototype will be pitched to a panel of judges who will judge the competitors according to a number of criteria.
What’s in it for you?
- If you win your heat, you’ll represent your university in the national finals at Standard Bank’s Global Leadership Centre in Johannesburg and attend a prize giving dinner.
- If you’re from a university outside of Johannesburg, we will pay for your flights and accommodation.
- If your team wins the HashBlock final, you will win devices as well as R125 000 for your university.
- If your team wins the IdeaChain, you will win R8 000 per team member.
What to do
Enter a team of up to four students with your lecturer. The heats will take place through your university LAN and your team must meet the following requirements:
- All participants must be South African citizens or permanent residents.
- At least one team member must be comfortable programming in Java (using Eclipse IDE, Python or C++).
- Team members should have enhanced their knowledge of BlockChain technology.
- Team members must have the energy and flair to solve problems and develop successful technology solutions to business problems while working against the clock.