The team of the Slovenian-English startup EqualEyes yesterday once again won a 24-hour programming marathon, this time at one of the biggest tech conferences, TechCrunch Disrupt London 2015! After this year’s Droidcon Hackathon at the end of October, where it won with a fun app for the Google smartwatch, they now convinced the Disrupt Hackathon jury with the app FreeMe for helping human trafficking victims. This is already the second resounding international achievement of the young startup, which is a member of Maribor-based university incubator Venture Factory, recipient of Slovene Enterprise Fund’s startup grant P2 and the first Slovenian member of the esteemed London startup accelerator Wayra. This win is already paying off, and the increased work load is making them actively look for new staff in the field of web and mobile technologies. Write to them at luka@equaleyes.com.
A win at one of the biggest tech conferences in the world!
TechCrunch Disrupt is one of the biggest tech and startup conferences, taking place today and tomorrow in the Copper Box Arena in London. From Saturday to Sunday, it was the venue of the 24-hour hackathon, won by the Slovenian-English team EqualEyes with the app FreeMe, in competition with 76 teams from all across the world.
Solution for a burning global problem
Solution FreeMe addresses the global problem of human trafficking. It enables the victims of these circumstances to call the help of a policeman by pressing a button on feminine hygiene dispensers placed in public toilets. After the press of a button, the app FreeMe creates the victim’s profile, including a photo and information about the time, location, gender and age, and shares it with the police. It also simultaneously dispenses a sanitary pad with an embedded beacon. When the woman is in proximity of a police officer, at a border crossing for example, the police officers will get an alert with the profile, and that she is nearby and needs their help immediately.
Solution for the public good
“The idea for the FreeMe solution, which we developed on the hackathon and presented together with the English partner Makelight, originated in us thinking about how we can contribute to a better world in the times of current crises, such as the immigration wave and the war in Syria, which additionally increases the number of people in distress and thus blows up the possibilities of taking advantage of them. We wish to offer the app FreeMe for the public good, make it available for organizations as well as governments that wish to solve the problem of human trafficking, and offer all the necessary technical support when doing so,” said Luka Topolovec, CEO of Equal Eyes, when receiving the award.
Another opportunity for the recognition of their solutions
Otherwise, the appearance at TechCrunch Disrup is an opportunity for the team of the Maribor-London startup to strengthen their recognisability on the English and global market, as well as among venture capital fund representatives and investors. At the same time, winning at an event such as a hackathon of one of the biggest tech conferences in the world, is an excellent opportunity for promoting their products, such as Watchface Editor (the first web editor to offer complete personalization of smart watch appearance), Pebble Apps (one of the most popular apps for smart watches Pebble) and EqualEyes, which is the user interface for the blind and visually impaired with which they placed amongst the eight best teams in the world at the finals of Microsoft’s Imagine Cup competition in New York in 2012.
--
Maribor-based Venture Factory is a co-leading partner of the Initiative Start:up Slovenia, in which we are actively tracking and promoting achievements of Slovenian startup companies.
Tags
Bootcamp
SK75
