Introduction

In the previous post I wrote about how I ended up at the UMP-JUST hackathon, how it went, and my takeaways.

This time I’ll focus on how we chose the theme and the technical side. (Keeping it short.)

What we built

We developed “Nihon GO UP app,” a service to support Japanese language learning for foreign workers, addressing the shortage of educational support for them.

How we chose the theme

• The hackathon theme was “build a service that uses generative AI to solve some problem.”
• The three of us brainstormed in advance using Miro.
• We narrowed down to about two ideas before the event and refined the business model on the day.
• We initially considered a service to help elementary-school kids with kanji reading and writing, but to narrow the target (which often matters in hackathons), we switched to “foreign workers.”

The service we built

Still writing…