UmojaHack Africa: The leading hackathon in the African data

UmojaHack Africa is the leading hackathon in the African data science space. With $10 000 in prizes for winners across 30 countries, and 2000 students from more than 300 universities participating over the weekend, UmojaHack is a life-changing event for its participants.

When the pandemic pushed UmojaHack to become a fully virtual event in 2020 and 2021, Zindi appointed us to level up the event in 2022. The objectives were to increase the number of competitors from more countries across the continent; to enhance the collaborative experience for participants; and to demonstrate return on investment for sponsors, including Microsoft, DeepMind and NVIDIA. 

We approached the project by mapping out four phases; Discovery, Planning, Execution, Evaluation. Here's what we did, across four phases over the course of 12 weeks:

• We identified the essentials, upgrades and non-essential luxuries for the project, setting KPIs and ensuring we kept budget and accessibility in mind. We had to make sure whatever we designed in a virtual setting didn't demand too much bandwidth, so that participants in countries with limited internet infrastructure couldn't join in.
• We created a unique visual identity and website for the event, which would act as a hub for all stakeholders and participants involved. Here, they could download resources and information which would help them prepare for the competition.
• We implemented a carefully curated social media campaign which generated 'FOMO' - we did this by creating country flag emojis and shareable graphics for all participants to post of Twitter, Instagram and Linkedin, with bespoke emoji flags in the shape of the UmojaHack icon to generate country pride. Partners and speakers also had a set of assets to share.
• We created an engaged community with pre-event, during-event and post-event activity - we achieved this with photo competitions and a collaborative Spotify playlist.
• We built a participation tool - using Discord - where teams and individual competitors could work collaboratively, see announcements and seek guidance in real time, in an accessible format.
• We demonstrated the scale of the competition by bringing in 'roving reporters' who gave live interviews with competitors. We had live contributions from Tunisia, Senegal, Tanzania, Kenya, Malawi, Nigeria and South Africa. 
• We ensured the event was accessible for everyone across the continent by using a widely used platform, but we enhanced the production by using V-mix and by having an MC to tie the whole event together from start to finish.

We approached Oddity Events to run our flagship hybrid event, UmojaHack Africa, because we were looking to level the event up in terms of marketing, event delivery and overall professionalism. 

They delivered in spades. Lizzy and her team came with creativity, enthusiasm, and an incredible can-do attitude, and nailed the brief, regularly going above and beyond to deliver an event that we are incredibly proud of. 

They were a pleasure to work with, and I can't imagine any group of people working harder to deliver an event than they did over the 12 weeks we worked together. I recommend them unreservedly.