Aprup Shet Founder, Startup Goa ap...@numadic.com Nine years ago, a group of local entrepreneurs and technology enthusiasts decided to do something about the startup scene in Goa. The idea was a simple one -- support local technology startups. Tired of waiting for IT parks and keen on supporting each other, school-mates Luke Sequeira and Caslino Pereira connected with fellow engineering student Aprup Shet, to form StartupGoa.org.
Fast forward to 2015 and Startup Goa had now become the go-to source community meetups and workshops. With the support and startup entrepreneurs from Canada (Chris Atkinson), the UK (Hannah Bain) and Sweden (Fabian Mossberg, Hampus Olsson), as well as resident nerds such as Siddharth Ashok and community champion Jervis Pereira, the squad of volunteers held a hackathon to build Goa's first technology-focused job board. Today, the StartupGoa job board is the go-to platform for nearly every one of Goa's tech startups to hire and for talent to find jobs. All of this was built by the community, with no external investment or regulatory support. Over 72,000 applicants used the platform since it was first built. October is known for Hacktober and the tech world is abuzz. In sync with the theme of the month and in time for the ninth year anniversary of StartupGoa.org, the original founders and a new generation of volunteers got together today to build the future of Goa's tech community platform. Volunteers from multiple engineering colleges and startups showed up at GreyScale HQ and online, including one particularly keen supporter Keenan Collaco, who joined in from Goa international airport. The Hackathon began on the 31st of October with volunteers from various fields. All the volunteers were split into 6 squads racing to deliver design, code and content, by 10pm Sunday, November 1. The two-day Hackathon is accelerating the development of the platform, adding features to make it easier for students to create profiles, find companies and find internships. Additionally, the platform is now expanding to make it easier for the wave of digital nomads that are moving to Goa, post Covid, to find coworking space, quality internet and good coffee (and chai!). Over the course of the two days, the volunteers got to interact and discover innovative ways to build the platform. The hackathon is a high pressure, time-limited event, with selected volunteers. The community expects Goa's technology scene to explode in the following months with the Covid driven migration of talented individuals and the platform is our warm embrace. "Within the next 10 years, Goa will be among India's top three start-up hubs," says Luke Sequeira, Founder of Startup Goa. "Earliest memories of Startup Goa was when we three used to meet up at Luke's house and discussing the next 5 years planning and deliberating on why we should not seek help and rather collaborate with right kind of people. Now we talk about the ten years and 25 years of a thriving startup ecosystem in Goa and projects that can lead to a better connect and collaboration between multiple fields and not only tech." QUOTES AND COMMENTS Here are a few quotes from the volunteers that contributed to the success of the event: "The idea of people coming together to build something which is going to help the future job seekers is what really motivated me to volunteer at the Community Hackathon." --Denali Dias (Media Engagement Team) "This was my first Hackathon; it was fun collaborating with people from across Goa remotely and communicating via Google Meets & Discords." --Dave Paiva (Gatsby Team) "Participating in community events such as this hackathon gives the participants an opportunity to network with people and learn from each other. This in turn lets them contribute for the society and do their bit with the skills that they have." --Yash Surve (UI/UX Team) "My mentor directed me to a workshop in 2015 and ever since I've been coding. Currently, I am learning about blockchain development. In this Hackathon, I learned a lot of new things like Custom Post types in WordPress and API Docs. I aspire to be an IT professional when I grow up." -Gajesh Naik (12 y/o, SEO and WordPress Team- Youngest Volunteer) APPS FOR VIRTUAL PARTICIPATION Some volunteers attended the event while the others joined virtually via Discord and Google Meets. Discord was used to communicate with the teams who were present in the office. Each squad had a different channel on the app for better communication. It provided a central place for instructions and information. It helped to ease the communication with the volunteers who were not present at the HQ. Github is an online code repository which was used for all the participants to access code and upload their work.