(Courtesy of JCT) Jerusalem College of Technology (JCT) students, Zev Tovbin and Peretz Levin, both from Bergenfield, worked on a mechanism for first responders to verbally fill out critical forms when arriving on the scene of an incident at the Jerusalem College of Technology’s 7th Great Minds Hackathon, where Israeli and international Orthodox and Ultra-Orthodox students worked tirelessly for 48 hours on challenges by the likes of Rafael Advanced Defense Systems, United Hatzalah, Rassini, AlphaTAU, FlyTech, SpotReality, and more.
Along with other JCT students who were part of their team, Levin and Tovbin worked on a challenge presented by United Hatzalah. When emergency forces arrive on a scene, they are required to record victim information, usually doing so by hand or by typing. Levin, Tovbin and their hackathon teammates saw the system was outdated and that it was subject to too much human error. As such, they worked to create a voice recognition software that can digitally upload this information, taking the audio file and converting it into readable text. By doing so, information is far more accurate for hospitals and clinics when they receive patients, and it saves a lot of time for medics in the process, potentially saving lives.
“At JCT, we place an enormous emphasis on providing hands-on skills and training to our students each year. Our industry partners are amazed each year by our students’ ability to build viable, working solutions to multiple challenges in such a short time,” said Orlee Guttman, co-founder of the LevTech Entrepreneurship Center and main organizer of the hackathon. “It’s a great experience for our students to bring to the job market when they graduate and/or from which to build their own startups.”
The hackathon is run by the LevTech Entrepreneurship Center of JCT, which also includes a pre-accelerator program to help students turn their ideas into products and start-ups. The winners were selected by a panel of judges from successful Israeli and international companies.
Yoni Colb, General Manager of Cross River in Israel and a judge at the hackathon, said: “Cross River is very proud to be the main sponsor of the hackathon of the Lev Academic Center. As a significant employer in the field of fintech in Israel, Cross River is constantly looking for high-quality and creative employees. We currently employ many graduates of the academic center Lev, who have integrated into all parts of the company, including in significant management positions, and we hope to continue the fruitful cooperation with the center in the years to come.”
The other judges at the hackathon were: Josh Wolff, COO at OurCrowd; Dr. Dov Rubin, CEO at HeartTrends; Elan Zivotofsky, Managing Director, Moelis & Company; David Stark, General Partner, Ground Up Ventures; Yoel Ezra, Founder & CEO, Engineering for All.
