Riverbank Initiatives have been announced as one of the Top 3 teams for this year’s 10toGO Thinkathon organized by Microsoft and Volkswagen Group in partnership with World Food Program, German Entrepreneurship, and MUST Munich, along with experts from the United Nations, and other organizations.
Riverbank, a Ghanaian team made up of Cornelius Owusu-Ansah, Joel Klo, Frances Hutchful, Amos Dikenu, and Emmanuel Baah, came up against strong competition from teams all across the world but blew the jury away with their project which is focused on tackling the issue of quality education (SDG 4) in Ghana and Africa using Artificial Intelligence.
The Top 3 teams were:
1. Pina, Germany.
2. Battery Dev, Germany.
3. Riverbank Initiatives, Ghana.
BatteryDev, which is a team from Battery Associates a unique and global network of battery enthusiasts connecting highly specialized researchers, scientists, industry leaders, programmers, practitioners, and corporations are known for their innovative work in the energy and battery sectors, came in second for their work on developing an open-source battery competition promoting sustainable battery development and innovation.
Taking first place was Pina, a Munich-based startup with the vision of quantifying and rewarding sustainable forestry. Their product, Pina, enables forest owners to participate in the voluntary carbon market by digitizing the manual certification process, aided by
remote sensing and artificial intelligence.
This year’s competition attracted over 100 individuals selected from across the world; forming a total of 20 teams. The teams entered the challenging 10toGo Thinkathon to refine their ideas and business offerings, including perfecting their business model, value proposition, and pitch, all with the aim of building ventures that address the U.N Sustainable Development Goals.
At the 10toGo Final, each of the teams pitched to a renowned jury that included Andy Goldstein (Co-founder & MD Deloitte Digital GmbH), Beate Hofer (Group CIO – Volkswagen AG), Christine Haupt (GM, Marketing & Operations – Microsoft Germany), Connie Hedegaard (Fmr EU Comm’r for Climate Action), Elhadj As Sy (Board Chairman – Kofi Annan Foundation & Fmr CEO -IFRCRC), Kyriacos Koupparis (Head of Frontier Innovations – World Food Program), Patrick van der Smaght (Director of AI research – VW Group), Tamy B. Ribeiro (Chief Mobility Evangelist & Head of Partnerships – Wunder Mobility), Victor Ohuruogu (Senior Africa Regional Manager – UN Foundation), and Jean-Yves Art (Senior Director, Strategic Partnerships – Microsoft Corp).
The Jury judged the team on real-world criteria including feasibility, scalability, job creation, and impact with Riverbank Initiatives adjudged as one of the top 3 teams.
The solution Riverbank Initiatives developed over the 1-month period of the competition and pitched, is an AI-model that predicts the program a student from one level (e.g. J.H.S) will most likely be successful in, in the next level (e.g. S.H.S) based on their grades, interests and other important factors.
This, coupled with a portal for accessing intellectually stimulating course content and
access to mentors makes their solution an all-round system that will dramatically improve the lives of students.
Source: Starrfm.com.gh/103.5FM
