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Bandwidth Hackathon Uncovers Creative Next Generation Voice & Messaging Apps
[June 19, 2015]

Bandwidth Hackathon Uncovers Creative Next Generation Voice & Messaging Apps


Bandwidth, one of the nation's fastest-growing communications companies, today announced the winners of TADHack Raleigh, a two-day developer hackathon where teams competed to build the next great advancement in communications technology. TADHack is a global event that was held in 14 countries at one time.

Following two days of coding, caffeine and creativity, winning technologies were chosen by an esteemed panel of judges including The Startup Factory's Chris Heivly, the Triangle Business Journal's Lauren Ohnesorge, Netsertive's Ramin Shahriari, Queue Software's Aidan Cunniffe and Bandwidth's (News - Alert) John Bell.

"We wanted to put the Bandwidth App Platform into the hands of talented and creative app developers," said Noreen Allen, CMO at Bandwidth. "We were blown away by the creativity of our hackers. The possibilities from embedded voice and messaging are endless. This past weekend's event only scratched the surface of what this technology can do, and we're looking forward to seeing the innovation that grows as a result of this competition."

The entries were judged by their creativity, readiness for market and technical quality. The winners - who took home prizes such as $1,000 cash, an Apple (News - Alert) Watch, an Oculus Rift and a drone - represent many of the most promising uses of voice and messaging to improve communications and disrupt industries.

Search the Web with SMS (GRAND PRIZE)
Created by North Carolina State University's Arjun Madan and Rohit Poduval, the app uses text messaging to deliver online search to populations lacking internet access. By integrating the Bandwidth App Platform into popular web APIs such as Google (News - Alert) Maps and Yahoo Weather, the app allows users to access directions, weather and online search queries with SMS messages.

Blind Date: Tinder for Blind People (GRAND PRIZE)
Developed by Preet Anand and Motiejus Osipova, the creators of the popular campus safety application BlueLight, the app is designed to allow users to evaluate potential matches through entirely audio and voice-related information, delivered in a quick-matching format.



Hot Potato
Developed by Ad Hoc Labs and winner of the "Most Ready for Market" category, Hot Potato is a team call handling app that instantly routes calls among a broader group through a simple drag and drop interaction.

GoPhone (Call Center in a Box (News - Alert))
Presented by CallRail, the app was the winner of the best use of both Bandwidth and Restcomm platforms. Created for users to instantly set up a call management system equipped to manage a high volume of calls, the app creates an instant queue of incoming calls, allowing managers to route calls to an available pool of respondents through a web-based UI.


Two Touch
Created by Erol Toker and John Ryan of Truly Wireless, the Two Touch application was the winner in the "Most Disruptive" category. Two Touch is a single app designed to access and interact with SMS services across all providers. By making every SMS app searchable in one online marketplace, Two Touch helps users easily interact with all SMS-enabled applications available to them, presented in a visually appealing interface similar to pure native applications.

One Step Beyond
Created by Matthew Gorton and Hunter Enoch, the app was developed for users to both send and receive anonymous text messages. One of the winners in the "Most Intuitive" category, the app allows users to authenticate themselves online without compromising the security of their personal phone number.

TextApp
Created by Joseph Jones and another winning idea in the "Most Intuitive" category, TextApp helps brands target new users by sending personalized, relevant content and offers to customers based off keywords found in their text conversations.

Gesture Handler
Created by Nadir Hamid and named the third "Most Intuitive" category winner, the app helps users conduct complex actions on smartphone devices with simple gestures (swipes, taps, etc.).

Catfacts
Created by recent University of North Carolina graduate Roman Myers, the winning college entrant was designed for those without smartphones to search Wikipedia's definitions and images via SMS and MMS messages.

This weekend's hackathon isn't the only special event that Bandwidth organizes for developers. For more on Bandwidth's benefits and work for developers, visit http://www.bandwidth.com/work-matters.

About Bandwidth
Bandwidth is among the nation's largest and fastest-growing communication technology companies. The company operates two divisions - business solutions and consumer (Republic Wireless) that share a mission of transforming the communications industry. Across the divisions, Bandwidth provides a full range of communications services, including voice origination, termination and toll free; a full suite of 9-1-1 services; SMS solutions; SIP Trunking; hosted VoIP for SMBs; and a consumer wireless business. Founded in 1999, and a certified CLEC in 49 states, Bandwidth is a profitable company headquartered in Raleigh, NC with a large remote office in Denver, CO and field offices in eight other cities.


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