PROGRAM OVERVIEW

The VinUni Sustainability Hackathon is a unique annual event for freshman students at
VinUniversity. The Hackathon serves as one of the culminating activities for the Agile
Innovation course, where students from all majors in VinUniversity learn about innovation
and entrepreneurship with this year’s focus on sustainability.

In this Hackathon, students will be working in teams of 10 students to complete a series

of tasks that will allow them to come up with a potential startup venture or innovation to
this year’s chosen theme. The teams will also be guided by facilitators to complete the
Hackathon mission, while also learning from the wisdom and insights of mentors
composed of industry experts and startup ecosystem leaders.

This year’s hackathon theme is: Sustainable Cultural Heritages which challenges students
to develop market-ready solutions, leveraging technology, innovative business models,
and community initiatives—that enhance and preserve Vietnam's cultural heritages
sustainably.

The event will be held on 30th November to 1st December 2024 at the VinUniversity
campus in Hanoi, Vietnam. This Hackathon is organized by College of Business and
Management with strategic partnership with Entrepreneurship Lab, VinUniversity.

YOUR ROLE AS MENTOR

As a mentor, you will support and encourage the teams to come up with an innovative
solution to the problems relating to sustainable cultural heritage. More importantly, you
will share your wisdom and experience with the participants and encourage them on their
own entrepreneurial journeys.

● Ask questions that probe into the team’s thought process.

● Give constructive feedback that help the team understand where they did well and

where they could improve.

● Provide examples or insights from real startups.

● Encourage the team to embody entrepreneurial spirit, including embracing failure and
learning from experience, not perfectionism.

Throughout the hackathon, the teams will be accomplishing a series of missions or tasks,
divided into three stages. These missions are not necessarily linear, and teams are
encouraged to continuously edit or iterate based on their research, learnings and
feedback they receive from users, facilitators, and mentors.

MENTORING SCHEDULE
As a mentor, you will work with a maximum of two teams (30 minutes/team) in one
mentoring session. Overall, we will have three mentoring sessions with the schedule and
focus of each session are found below. We might invite you to join one or two mentoring
sessions if you are available.

Venue:
● Classroom: C401 & K101 (Sport Complex), VinUni Campus, Vinhomes Ocean Park, Đa
Tốn, Gia Lâm, Hà Nội

Notes
● Team will sign up for your mentoring sessions on the first come, first serve basis.
Organizers will inform you of the list of signed-up teams and meeting venues on the
Friday evening before the event. On Saturday, our facilitators will actively reach out to you
and help you to meet and work with all the teams signed-up for your mentoring. When
needed, please ask the team for additional context.

Mentoring Session 1: Problem Definition

30th November (Saturday) | 11:15AM-12:30PM

The first mentoring session focuses on problem definition. In this first milestone, you will
help the team have a solid understanding of what they’re trying to solve before they
continue working on their ideas.

Some of the guide questions you may use throughout the discussion include:

✓ Does the team have deep and painful problems to solve?

✓ Is the target user, customer, group clear?
✓ Is the problem significant and worth exploring?
✓ What could be the causes of the problem?
✓ What are examples of startups that are like what the team is building, or what are
learnings from real startups that the team can use for inspiration?

By this time, the team is expected to have the following output:

✓ Research on the problem area

 ✓ A problem statement and target user
✓ Multiple ideas addressing the problem statement
✓ A working idea with descriptions of 1-3 key features
✓ Research on business models of similar startups (competitors, substitutes, or other
startups addressing a similar problem)

Mentoring Session 2: Problem-Solution Fit and Product-Market Fit

30th November (Saturday) | 15:15 PM - 16:15 PM

The second mentoring session focuses on problem-solution fit and product-market fit. In
this second milestone, you will help the team to ensure that what they are building can
solve the user's problem and has a potential market.

Some of the guide questions you may use throughout the discussion include:

• Is the solution directly, and creatively, addressing the problem?

• How does the team validate their product with users? What did they learn from
user
• testing?
• Is there a clear market for the product? How big is the market?
• How would users feel if the product was suddenly gone from the market?
• Is the business model viable and shows a path to profitability or cashflow positive?
• Does the team understand all the financial components of their plan in the early
stages of the startup?

By this time, the team is expected to have the following output:

• Competitor analysis
• Unique value proposition
• Market research to backup recommendations
• Customer acquisition and growth plans
• A prototype and feedback for user testing
• Business model
• Rought financial projection

Mentoring Session 3: Presentation and Pitching

30th November (Saturday) | 17:00 PM-18:00 PM
The final mentoring session focuses on overall presentation and Q&A. In this third
milestone, you will listen to the completed presentation of the team in 10 minutes and
give them comments & feedback to sharpen their ideas and improve their performance.

On Sunday morning, all teams must pitch their projects to judges in the first round. 8 best
teams\projects will be selected to pitch in the final round in the afternoon at Auditorium.
You are warmly invited to join the Final round of Hackathon on Sunday afternoon.

Format of pitching/presentation:
Teams will have 10 minutes to present and another 5 minutes of Q&A with judges

The presentation should include the following information:

1. Problem-Define the problem in one sentence and provide a third-party fact with
the name of the party that provided the fact that substantiated the Problem.
2. Solution- Explain in one-sentence the AI solution you are recommending.
3. Market Research-Provide named third-party facts that provide information
✓ Market size and growth
✓ Target audience and customer segmentation
✓ Industry insights
4. Process for developing final product/service-Describe in steps how you plan to
develop the product/service.
5. Use of Technology-Explain how Technology will be used.
6. Potential Intellectual Property-Explain what potential intellectual property you
will have. You can type this into Chat or MindPal to ask what the potential
intellectual property opportunities are.
7. Marketing Strategy and Tactics-Describe the check writers, users and influencers,
the strategy to reach each group and the tactics you will use to get their attention.
Do this in spreadsheet form with strategy and tactic on the left side vertically and
the target audience horizontally across the top.
8. Sales Strategy-The sales strategy and whether you will use in-house sales,
strategic partners/distributors or rely on marketing with no salespeople.
9. Revenue Streams-List of all potential revenue streams and what would be
potentially charged.
10. Competition-List of competitors in a spreadsheet with no more than three
horizontally across the top and the categories for comparison vertically.
11. Talent needed and positions to fill-List of the positions that need to be filled in
the beginning, skills needed and what they are responsible for.
 12. Operations-Space and technology needed
13. Financial Projections-Top line income, bottom line expenses and profit/loss. (A
spread sheet should be developed that shows how you arrived at the numbers.)
14. Capital Needs and Uses- How much money you need to launch and how you will
use it such as $250,000 USD for marketing and $500,000 USD for sales, etc.
15. Launch Plan- A launch plan in spread sheet form or timeline on how you will
develop and launch it.

Some of the guide questions you may use throughout the discussion include:

✓ Are the important components of the pitch deck well-articulated in the mock pitch?
✓ What information is missing and what can be removed?
✓ What information or parts of the pitch can be presented better?
✓ Does the team provide a clear and easy-to-follow narrative or flow of presentation?
✓ Did they provide an executable solution?

By this time, the team is expected to have the following output:

✓ The first draft of the final presentation covered all 15 points mentioned above.
✓ Pitcher(s) and slide movers
✓ Demo/prototype/user interface (optional)

For questions and support, please contact Mr. Nguyen Van Thinh
([email protected])