Danfoss challenge at Energy Efficiency Hackathon

For 12 hours (and more), more than 100 engineers, coders, designers, psychologists, corporations and entrepreneurs worked intensely on three ideas pitched by European companies. Danfoss was one of them – and had the most popular challenge.

“Seven out of 16 teams chose to work with us. From the very beginning, I predicted the more diverse teams to be well positioned in the competition. And the power of teaming up with others having different backgrounds was proven right. The Danfoss challenge winner had members coming from Vietnam, Moldavia, India, Germany and Sweden,“ says Søren Hesseldahl, Director, Frontend Innovation, Danfoss Heating. He was in Berlin during the Hackathon as a coach and as member of the jury.

The hack from Danfoss was “Making heating smart for everyone” and took its starting point on how to make multifamily houses smarter, with the aim of finding initiatives to lower energy consumption and increase tenants’ satisfaction.

“The winner of our Danfoss challenge suggested a new business model, including new ways of addressing the multifamily houses market for electronic heating controls. So, the Hackathon was definitely worth engaging in from a result-oriented point of view,“ he says.

The Hackathon took place in Berlin on March 6 from 10 am – 10 pm, and participants were invited to hack on three complex and exciting energy efficiency challenges.

Sammarth Khumar, PhD student in Energy Economics, TU Dresden, originally from India, participated in the Hackathon:
“As a PhD student in Energy Economics, my focus is on energy efficiency. It has become very clear to me that energy efficiency is the lowest-hanging fruit when it comes to beating climate change. That is why I am here today.”

The seven Danfoss teams took home four out of eight prices in categories such as: best business model, best customer insight and, overall, best team of the hackathon. The winning team in the Danfoss challenge will go to Danfoss in Nordborg to visit and present their idea to business management.

The event was organized by Deutsche Unternehmensinitiative Energieeffizienz e.V. (DENEFF). Together with interdisciplinary experts and coaches, students and start-ups, the aim is to create new sustainable energy efficiency solutions to fight climate change.

Source: Danfoss