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Innovation is something that excites us tremendously at Cashfree Payments.
And what better way for a tech-first company to bring its people together and nurture the sprouts of new ideas, than an organisation-wide hackathon?
So, we decided to bring this enthusiasm to life.
What is Switch On?
Switch On is the very first hackathon at Cashfree Payments that promotes cross-team collaboration within the company to create unique and impactful products, features, and solutions.
Why?
Because hackathons are one of the best ways to get fresh ideas, from those who know the ecosystem in and out.
With Switch On, we wanted Cashiens to tune into their hacker minds and come up with innovative products and solutions. A hackathon would fast-track the process of bringing their ideas to reality, yielding solutions that could create great payments and banking experiences for businesses, customers, and the industry.
What’s in a name
Before there was ‘Switch On’, there was only an idea – an innovation fest meant to bring people together and give their ideas a platform. We determined coming up with a name to be our first order of business.
‘What’s in a name’ was a Cashfree-wide naming ceremony for our project. With the excitement running high, we saw a flood of entries from the Cashien crowd as soon as the contest was announced.
We finally named our hackathon ‘Switch On – The Gateway to Innovation.’
Here, ’Switch’ refers to the payments switch – the tool that facilitates communication between different payment providers. The tagline “Gateway to innovation” is a play on Payment Gateway. The rationale behind this nomenclature was to retain the essence of what we do as a company.
And, the next step – the great unveil, with our logo.
Streamlining the ideas flowing in
To spark inspiration amid our participating teams, we zeroed in on four themes upon which they could develop.
Cashfree Products ++
As an organisation that puts its customers above all, encouraging ideas that make our customers’ payments experience richer was a no brainer. With that in mind, we conceptualised our first theme: Cashfree Products ++.
This theme encompassed ideas for new products and features to do with all-things-payments. It also included ideas that could improve the performance and experience of our existing products.
Finance
Being a fintech company, we know just how hard it can be to manage finances for businesses (and individuals). We also know that creating tailored solutions to the unique problems of businesses is no mean feat. This brought us to our next theme – Finance.
All ideas related to personal financial management, mobile banking, investment, bill reminders, budgets, debt management, tax, small business finance, insurance and payments were covered in this theme.
Security
Threats are rife in the digital world. And, with money, ensuring security and keeping such threats at bay is paramount. For, the smallest crack in the security infrastructure can have devastating consequences for any business. Hence, our next theme – Security.
This theme covered ideas around data security, application security, communication security, and API security. The point was to nurture endeavours towards making existing systems stronger and more watertight.
Team Productivity Tools
There’s always a way to make efficient use of time at work. And, while we have umpteen tools at our disposal to boost productivity and make our lives easier, processes always have room for optimisation. Our final theme, Team Productivity Tools, was all about that.
Under the ambit of this theme were ideas around products that could help with task management, calendar management, translation, note taking, printing, password management, cloud storage, email clients, flowchart generators, audio dictation, simulation, and data viewing. It also included tools to help with coding, testing, debugging, workflow management, and text and code editing.
The rules of the game
The themes were ready. The reveal was done. It was time to open the floor for registrations!
We took the first step towards setting the stage for innovation by creating our own Hackathon Registration Portal. It helped people network and find teammates, helped create unique judging panels with our algorithm, assigned demo rooms, and later became our leaderboard – displaying team positions during the D-days.
We made the team formation rules such that they ensured maximum participation and collaboration.
- The team would comprise of at least two and at most five people
- At least one member had to be from outside product & engineering teams, such as marketing, sales, design, and HR
- Each team was required to have at least one tech member (product and engineering)
- Each team had to have a name (the more creative, the better!)
Next, they created a one-pager defining their idea containing:
- problem(s) they were going to solve,
- target group and stakeholders,
- rationale behind solving this problem,
- business model (if any),
- capabilities of the product/feature in development, and
- enabling technologies involved.
Teams then had to go through three rounds of evaluation, based on five parameters. Cashiens were left to ponder upon these questions for their ideas:
- Problem research, definition and pitch, and the business value of the solution: How can you define the problem, and why is it worth solving? What value would solving this problem create from a business perspective?
- Uniqueness and creativity: How is your team solving the problem at hand creatively?
- Proximity to productisation: How close is your prototype to becoming a functional market offering?
- Impact of the product: How does your idea make a social change, save money, save time, or create any other tangible impact?
- Demonstration: How well can you demonstrate the abilities of your prototype?
But, how did teams go about ensuring that their problem statement is sound?
How did they know if they’re not missing out on bigger problems in the ecosystem that they could address?
How did they choose the best among the many ideas they had?
Enter Mentors.
Senior members from across Cashfree came on board to lend their expertise, perspective, and encouragement to our participants. They took on teams and helped hone their ideas, approving their one-pagers before evaluation, and being their guiding light throughout the event.
They helped teams by selecting the best problem statement to go after, and in many cases, brought novel problem statements to the mentee teams’ attention. They also sharpened problem statements and pitches, and provided pointed feedback on the solutions proposed.
Being from varied backgrounds, mentors also helped their teams make their solutions GTM-ready, with both technical and non-technical inputs.
The result? 57 phenomenal ideas making a debut on demo day.
And the excitement begins!
When it came to creating a buzz for the event, we left no stone unturned. Among ensuring timely team formation, pre-event engagement and managing our communication channels, there was a lot of ground to cover.
Decking up the HQ
Our office became our canvas in the days leading up to the event. From danglers to flyers to standee installations and a photo booth, we ensured that our office reflected the excitement in the air!
We made it a point to keep our imagery and colours striking. This percolated into all our creative decisions – which was soon visible all over our Bengaluru HQ.
The contests before the contest
To pump up our folks, we presented a dazzling array of contests – each carrying a reward.
The announcement made our Slack channels spring to life. We saw very creative entries for all the contests – some of which were just too good not to share with the world!
We also had Meme-a-thon for Cashiens to bond over some healthy trolling. The contest accounted for the giggles and laughter we heard all over our offices!
Bringing the troops together
There were teams without tech members, looking for tech members.
There were teams with only tech members, looking for other-than-tech members.
And there were solitary hackathon enthusiasts, looking for the right team to join.
We brought them together for a Hackster’s Mixer. Over Samosas.
And, our samosas did the trick – 18 teams formed over the course of the evening.
Switching On our social campaign
We kicked off our social media campaign a month before the event. In the days leading up to the hackathon, we built up excitement on all our handles – starting with teasers, followed by the reveal, and ultimately announcing that Switch On had begun.
On the days of the hackathon, we were live on our handles with handpicked updates every hour.
The social campaign was designed to showcase the excitement in the house and how our hacksters took time off to have fun, while they were hard at work on the D-days.
We garnered upwards of 2,00,000 impressions, with an average engagement rate of 5.26% – making this one of our most loved social campaigns to date!
D-Days
Preparations, made. Ideas, finalised. One-pagers, approved. Laptops, charged.
It was time.
Day 1: And we #SwitchedOn!
The day kicked off with our participants making their way to the Bengaluru HQ, where they were greeted with exciting goodies and breakfast.
The welcome address followed. Arun Tikoo, our SVP, spoke to the participating teams about the spirit of the hackathon and how eventful the next 48 hours were to be. With that, we kicked off our two-day innovation fest.
While our teams were hard at work, we made sure they had some fun with on-spot interviews and introductions!
Good work hardly happens on an empty stomach. Which is why, we also made sure our teams were well-fed throughout.
As the day progressed, our hacksters went deeper into code mode. And, come dinnertime, it was time to have some fun. We had our in-house DJ, Pulkit Sharma, take the stage to make everyone groove, before they geared up to burn the midnight oil.
Having enjoyed a scrumptious dinner over some beats, Cashiens got ready for their second innings – armed with sleeping bags, coffee, and their laptops.
Our hacksters coded their way through the night, with the dedication that’s the hallmark of the Cashien spirit. The next day unfolded to be all the more action-packed.
Day 2: Judgement Day
After having worked tirelessly to bring their visions to demonstrable reality, Cashiens started the second leg of the hackathon: evaluation.
After breakfast, the evaluation lineup was announced. Each team would have to present before a three-member panel. But, no three-member panel would be the same: we built an algorithm that shuffled panellists such that each panel was unique.
Evaluation of the participating teams happened in three rounds.
Round 0 took place before the hackathon, wherein we screened the ideas of the participating teams after their one-pagers were approved.
57 teams went into round 1 on the second day of the hackathon. And, each of them pulled off an excellent demonstration before the panellists.
Per evaluation guidelines, only 10 teams would progress to the finale. But, making it impossible for the mentors to choose among their ideas and demonstrations, 16 teams made it to round 2.
One such team was Finterns. This team consisted of interns who had joined us just the day before and decided to sign up for the hackathon – leaving all of us in awe of their work.
The top 16 put forth powerful presentations, demonstrating some very creative problem-solving. But, just before the scores were settled and we knew the first-ever winners of Switch On, our co-founder and CEO had a surprise announcement to make.
“In addition to the winning prize of Rs.3,00,000,” said Akash Sinha, “the winning team would be sent to Dubai to Global DevSlam.”
The effect of the announcement was electric!
And, once the evaluations were concluded and the judges had deliberated, it was time to announce the winners.
Bagging the title of the first ever winners of Switch On were Flawless SuperSonics – who also took home ₹3,00,000 and their tickets to Dubai!
The runners up were SDE (Sleep Deprived Engineers), with ₹2,00,000 coming their way for their phenomenal work.
In third place, winning an award of ₹1,00,000, were Its HR Thing – a unique team with three HR and just one tech member, who worked from different locations and made the magic happen.
We brought two action-packed days Switch On to a close with food, music, and a ton of memories we made in just 48 hours.
The heroes behind the scenes
We can’t have a highlight reel of the event without making a mention of our supporting cast. Our staff worked day and night to make the event a success, as did our on-ground photography team. From ensuring lunch and dinner arrived on time to arranging sleeping bags for our night owls, they went above and beyond to keep the event sailing smoothly.
Switching Off – but not for long
Experiences of today become the foundation of greater things of tomorrow. Switch On was one such experience for the Cashien collective.
We’re more pumped than ever before to take Switch On to greater heights in the years that follow. We’ll be back next year – bigger, better, and louder.
