Intern Innovation at our 5th Annual Intern Hackday

LinkedIn's 5th Annual Intern Hackday took place this past weekend and was filled with non-stop hacking, unlimited energy drinks, and even human bowling… yes, you read that right. This event brought together around 220 interns from tech companies all across the Bay Area, including Facebook, Twitter, and Google.

The first round of preliminary judging had more than 40 submissions. By the end of the hackathon, 13 teams made it to the final round. The judges, Akshay Kothari, James Beshara, and Matt Huang, reviewed some really creative projects, including an app called “Pants or No Pants” that tells you whether or not you need to… well, wear pants. Here’s a quick overview of the top three winning teams.

First place: The $10,000 grand prize went to “Handoff,” a Google Chrome extension that allows groups of friends to easily and securely share different accounts with each other without revealing any login credentials. Supported services include Netflix, HBO, The New York Times, and NFL.

Congrats to the 1st place team: Christian Mathiesen, Eric Brownrout, Fernando Trujano, Clement Fung, and George Lok.

Second place: “LAP: Life After Prison” was a website built to help prisoners reintegrate into society upon release. The app would catch the former convicts up to speed on major news events, remind them when to eat meals, and point them to various rehabilitation resources.

Congrats to the 2nd place team: Emily Chaoi, Zhifan Lii, and Paulina Zengi.

Third place: Wondering how to combat gender inequality in the workforce? “BiaSees” has a great solution. This app scans job descriptions and determines whether or not the posting is using words or phrases that intimidate certain genders and deter them from applying. It then suggests words that are more gender-neutral.

Congrats to the 3rd place team: Maya Rotmensch, Virginia Steindorf, Benjamin Koatz, Yuval Shafir, and Dylan Gattey​.

Overall, the LinkedIn team and our judges were blown away by all the projects. As judge James Beshara, CEO of Tilt, said, "Our product at Tilt is all about helping groups and communities make awesome things happen. LinkedIn’s HackDay did just this for hundreds of incredibly smart, creative, and driven individuals. You could feel the hunger for innovation. Easily some of the highest quality hackday demos I’ve seen.”

We really appreciate all the judges and participants who made it out to our hackday. Also, huge thanks to everyone on the LinkedIn team who made this event possible. See you next year!