By Ucha Vekua, Lead Organizer of Techstars Startup Weekend Tallinn

The very first Techstars Startup Weekend event in Tallinn, Estonia, was a massive, massive success.

Startup Adventures, together with Estonian Business School, Startup Garage, and ESN Tallinn, managed to bring back the old hackathon vibes in Tallinn with the sole aim of inspiring the next generation of entrepreneurs in Estonia. 

Think of this event as a platform where students and startup enthusiasts have an opportunity to test their ideas, connect with each other, and improve their skills along the way.

So, from the 2nd to the 4th of May, the entire fourth floor of the Estonian Business School was transformed into a fancy atelier where individuals attempted to bring their craziest ideas to life.

What was the impact of the organizers' efforts, you ask? Well, here’s a little breakdown:

• 57 participants showed up on the first day

• They pitched a total of 19 ideas on the stage

• Formed 10 teams to develop products

• All 10 teams managed to present a live demo on Sunday

Sounds crazy, doesn’t it?! Let’s get into this story in more detail. 

Day 1 – Pitching & Team Formation

Our event kicked off with the 90-second idea pitching session on Friday. Every single participant had an opportunity to come to the stage and present whatever project or startup idea they had in mind to build throughout the weekend. 

Presenters could show visuals, talk about problems they wanted to solve, showcase tech, or even demonstrate solutions in order to make other participants interested in their idea. That way, they could form teams and officially start working on developing their product throughout the hackathon.

Not everyone had to pitch their ideas, though. In fact, most of the hackathon participants usually tend to listen to pitches from other contestants, and then they join the idea that they like the most. As a result, 19 participants decided to come to the stage and deliver a 90-second pitch of their brainchildren.

It was honestly amazing to hear all of the pitch-masters rocking the stage and passionately sharing their views with others. 

Gamified language-learning platform, data protection solution, AI brain rot-creating tool, and an innovative tourism app are just a short list of ideas that were pitched on the stage on Friday evening. However, not all 19 ideas managed to qualify to continue development at the hackathon.

In order for an idea to qualify, the idea owner must put together a proper team with enough skill set to bring the idea prototype to life within the next 48 hours. This kind of selection process led us to have 10 strong teams participating in the Startup Weekend Tallinn and competing for prizes. 

And that’s how we finally wrapped up Day 1 of this event. 

Day 2 – Idea Development & Mentorship Sessions

The second day of the hackathon was more about creating a comfortable and supportive space for participants to actually think about their solutions and build their idea prototypes for the finals. That’s why we placed tables in huge open rooms with lots of whiteboards to create a comfortable environment for teams to bring their ideas to life. 

Other than creating a supportive environment, it was also important to give them proper mentorship to help them mature their ideas and take them to the next level. Thanks to our local partners, we managed to bring world-class mentors to talk to the teams and give them the guidance they needed to finalize their concepts and gain different perspectives.

Mentors were present from organizations like Latitude59, Tera Ventures, EstBAN, Tenity, Tallinn Incubator, and others.

We had three hours dedicated to the mentorship sessions, where we created a chill environment for mentors to go around the teams and ask about their progress in terms of developing their ideas. Both teams and mentors seemed to really enjoy talking with each other.

In fact, these mentorship sessions went well over time, and conversations were really useful for teams to shape their products in the best way possible. 

Throughout Day 2, teams managed to conceptualize their ideas, work on product development, hear from the world-class mentors, and prepare for the grand finals for the next day.

Day 3 – Live Demos & Grand Finale

The final day of Techstars Startup Weekend Tallinn was all about teams wrapping up their work and demonstrating what they had achieved in the past 48 hours.

It was the day for the Grand Finale — this means that teams had to present their prototypes and live demos in front of an audience and a special jury. 

Each team had three minutes on the stage to talk about their solution, demonstrate the business value behind their idea, and showcase the live demo to attendees.

Our special jury members would then evaluate these pitches from each team to determine the winners of the hackathon.

Teams did not come to the Grand Finale unprepared, though. Everyone had an opportunity to practice their pitch on so-called Pitch Drill sessions and get feedback from the professional mentors.

A special jury consisted of 6 members from various Estonian startup organizations:

• Kai Isand from Latitude59

• Tõnis Bramanis from Veebimajutus.ee

• Getter Orav from Startup Estonia

• Franck Nouyrigat from Startup Weekend

• David Clark from Tera VC

• Neele Plutus from Tallinn Incubator

They were all eager to hear about the participants' work and give a fair judgment to determine the winners.

It was just fabulous to listen to all of those teams passionately pitching their ideas and showcasing their demos.

All of the 10 teams successfully managed to build their prototypes on a high level and deliver a quality pitch in front of an audience. We had a wide range of solutions being presented on the stage, which was the very goal of this hackathon from the beginning.

More importantly, our organizing team made sure that every single participant, mentor, jury member, and attendee had tons of fun while making new friends, working on projects, and improving their skills along the way. If that doesn’t sound magical to you, we don’t know what else does.

Check out the final video from this event:

Thank You to Everyone Who Helped Us Put This Event Together!

All of the organizers — Startup Adventures, Startup Garage, ESN Tallinn. 

All of the sponsors and supporters — Startup Estonia, Estonian Business School, Veebimajutus.ee. 

All of the mentors.

And, of course, all of the participants who showed up at the event! It would have been impossible without you. YOU ALL ROCK!

Check out more images and vibes from this event through this link.

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See you at the next one :)

“If you have any ideas for the future startup events or want to contribute to putting together the next hackathon, feel free to reach out to me on LinkedIn to chat.”

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