I was lucky enough to be part of the second one, hosted in Latvia a week ago. The hackathon went from idea on Sunday (the first text I received was on Monday 16 March) to final results on Thursday. This included €25k from the Ministry of Economic Development and support from the President of Latvia. Health care providers were asked what their top needs were and teams were challenged to find solutions of these.

The top teams from Latvia are now fully operational in less than a week, including:

• 3D printing face masks, and working with local SMEs to retool to produce face masks
• a mechanical ventilator
• an app to help people who cannot leave get goods and services, connecting them with volunteers

I am not a techie and instead was a mentor, helping four teams identify their product market fit, challenging them to think about how this addresses an identified need, and connecting them to potential people in Latvia who might need and or help their product (e.g.: reaching out to the border community to find a lawyer who was knowledgable about privacy in Europe). Also note; I don't speak Latvian - this was all done in English

It was a very rewarding experience and I am trying to amplify both the winners here and the opportunities across the world.

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