Stellantis Hackathon isn’t as Nefarious as it Sounds

Last weekend, Stellantis held the company’s first “Hackathon”, inviting college students from around the area to team up to showcase their programming skills. The name Hackathon may suggest that these students were trying to hack into the various systems, but that wasn’t the case. Instead, the teams of students used data from Stellantis vehicles, the cloud-based Stellantis software development kit (SDK) and input from Stellantis software engineers to develop an app that helps drivers operate their vehicles more safely and more efficiently.

Stellantis Hackathon

“The power of data is fueling Stellantis on its journey to transform mobility and seamlessly integrate vehicles into people’s lives,” said Yves Bonnefont, Stellantis chief software officer. “We are thrilled to offer young and bright students the opportunity to sharpen their skills in a real and exciting environment and pitch their ideas to our software experts. Challenges like these not only prove how data can help find new ways to create customer-focused applications; they also unlock the power of teams, which in turn creates new levels of innovation, making driving safer and environmentally friendly.”

Stellantis Hackathon

The students were asked to “gamify” the act of driving safer and more efficiently in a smartphone app that rewards you for smoother, safer driving and takes points away when you are using too much gas or driving in an erratic manner. These apps look at parameters such as braking activity, acceleration rate, throttle input, vehicle speed and other inputs to provide a score. In short, the goal was to create an app that encourages safer, more fuel friendly driving in a game-like format.

Stellantis Hackathon

The winning team was awarded $15,000 while second place got $5,000 and third took home $2,000.

Stellantis Hackathon

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