innovAGEING Challenge Winners Looking to the Future
Image: iA Challenge winners St Basil’s NSW & ACT for their prototype What’s Up? With judges and event sponsors.
The winners of Australia’s first ever innovAGEING Challenge – a national aged services hackathon – are hoping their innovations will attract investment and support for future development.
St Basil’s NSW & ACT were crowned innovAGEING Challenge Champions for their prototype called ‘What’s Up?’, an app connecting older persons with their family, community associations, and care providers via nudge and behavioural theory.
Runners up were Risk Managed, for their app prototype, ‘SmartCare’, a just-in-time video training service aimed at care workers.
Winning the People’s Choice Award was Uniting War Memorial Hospital for their prototype, ‘Smooth Mooves’, a tracking and alerting technology that connects patient pre-fall movements with the nurse caring for them.
Merlin Kong, Head of innovAGEING, said starting with a pool of 29 teams meant that standards were very high with the top 8 teams in the final round of the Challenge.
“Thanks to KPMG design and technical staff, it’s exciting to see so many smart and creative ideas be given life as working prototypes with the aim of achieving better outcomes for the wellbeing of older Australians and their families.
“The winning teams have made it through a rigorous three-stage process co-designed by KPMG, the Commonwealth Bank, and innovAGEING—which covered innovation curriculum, an in-person ideation workshop, and a hackathon.
“They will now have access to the Commonwealth Bank’s Innovation Lab expertise, and take part in the CBA’s 10 week mini-incubator program to potentially pitch to prospective investors.
Nicki Doyle, Partner for Health, Ageing, and Human Services at KPMG says:
“Congratulations to the winners, and all teams who participated in the innovAGEING Challenge. Innovation is a key component to transforming the aged care sector. The ideas generated during the Challenge have the capacity to support better outcomes for older Australians, challenging current paradigms of care. The ideas demonstrate the power of creativity, collaboration and technical capacity to solve complex problems within the ageing sector.”
Belinda Hegarty, National Head of Healthcare at the Commonwealth Bank says:
“It was a tremendous day with all teams contributing and collaborating to drive better outcomes across the sector. All participants are to be commended for their creativity, design thinking while truly keeping the consumer at the centre of all ideas. CBA is proud to be involved with such an inspiring group and we are looking forward to taking the teams through our incubator programme to flesh out the ideas, business model and get them pitch ready.”
“In Australia, innovators and start-ups need to collaborate with institutional and incumbent organisations in order to scale-up and grow,” added Mr Kong.
“We understand this at innovAGEING, and with the help of our partners at KPMG and Commonwealth Bank, we look forward to running the challenge again next year.”
For more information:
David O’Sullivan, Leading Age Services Australia,
E: davido@lasa.asn.au, Ph: 0427 138 024
