Block, Inc, the global technology company with a focus on financial services, has announced the winners of the highly anticipated TBD Hackathon, a competition designed to foster innovation, creativity, and technological advancements in payments across Africa.
The competition, organized in partnership with the Africa Bitcoin Conference, tasked developers with creating innovative payment solutions using tbDEX, TBD’s open-source money protocol which includes the likes of Yellow Card and Chipper Cash as partners.
REMITTANCES | Chipper Cash Joins tbDEX Ecosystem in Effort to Drive Down Remittance Costs
Chipper Cash, serving over 5 million users across 21 African countries, has integrated with the tbDEX protocol.
This integration enables liquidity for B2C and B2B cross-border payments… pic.twitter.com/UDHMo4zWnJ
— BitKE (@BitcoinKE) May 22, 2024
Hackathon participants addressed key challenges such as limited banking access, high transaction fees, and inefficient cross-border payments. Teams of 1-2 developers utilized the tbDEX SDK to create payment applications within a sandbox environment.
Emmanuel Kufre, the grand prize winner, developed Blink – a decentralized wallet application serving as a payment processor for freelancers.
The judges were impressed by the project’s focus on Africa’s $28 billion gig economy market. Blink is now in beta testing across five countries.
Other outstanding projects that were presented include:
- tbDEX Go, created by Andrew Glago and Eloke Ikiliagwu, and
- Igbigi, developed by Achego Tamunobelema and Fabari Agbora
tbDEX Go provides a localized payment solution for travelers and tourists in Africa, while Igbigi offers a payment application enabling instant app-to-bank and app-to-app transfers with a strong emphasis on privacy. The teams were awarded $10,000 and $5,000 in BTC, respectively.
“The level of creativity and technical expertise showcased during the TBD Hackathon has been truly inspiring,” said Angie Jones, Global VP of Developer Relations at Block.
“There is so much incredible talent and innovation taking place all over the continent, and the winning teams are truly representative of the future of financial solutions across Africa. They have all demonstrated a deep understanding of the challenges facing a pan-African payment system, and have developed solutions that have the potential to transform the way people transact.
We look forward to seeing how these exceptional developers continue to drive innovation in payments and in technology overall.”
The hackathon was judged by a panel including:
- Aaron Suplizio (Tech Partnerships, TBD)
- Adewale Abati (Staff Developer Advocate, TBD)
- Angie Jones (Head of Developer Relations, TBD)
- Ari Coleman (Product Manager, TBD)
- Chris Maurice (CEO, Yellow Card)
- Ebony Louis (Developer Advocate, TBD)
- Kirah Sapong (Senior Software Engineer, Square)
- Rizèl Scarlett (Staff Developer Advocate, TBD)
- Tania Chakraborty (Senior Technical Community Manager, TBD)
- Tony Tom (Head of Product, TBD)
- Will Wilkinson (Head of Policy, TBD).
While the TBD business has been discontinued, its work on decentralized identity continues under the Decentralized Identity Foundation.
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