Collaboration with our clients is key to AND’s way of working. We put a high value on providing our partners with creative opportunities to innovate, gain new skills and improve ways of working. Our recent hackathon with Parcel2Go is a testament to this commitment, facilitating an extended working session to encourage participants to come up with innovative solutions, work across departments and challenge each other with new approaches to enhance the customer experience.

Introduction: The Power of Hackathons

In the fast-paced tech world, hackathons have become an epicentre of collaboration, creativity and innovation. These coding marathons challenge participants to think beyond the ordinary, turning their visions into tangible solutions in mere hours or days. For the AND Digital & Parcel2Go teams, this meant two days for our software engineers to focus on innovation and creative problem solving. 

Three Teams, Three Innovations

Our participants formed three teams, all aiming to start with a blank whiteboard and deliver a working proof of concept. Teams were tasked with coming up with fresh ideas to benefit the customer - by embedding Artificial Intelligence into their current processes. The ideas that were formulated led to three working prototypes:

1. AI for SME Market Insights

By harnessing the power of AI, this idea proposes offering advice to our Subject Matter Expert (SME) customers about additional markets and complimentary products they could potentially dive into, using their transaction history as a foundation.

The Impact: SMEs often lack the resources to conduct extensive market research. With this AI-driven tool, they could make more informed decisions, capitalise on new opportunities, and drive growth effortlessly.

2. AI-Driven Bug and Incident Triage

The Idea: Imagine an AI system that swiftly identifies, prioritises, and triages tech issues. This innovation promises to do just that, ensuring that the severity of every tech ticket raised aligns perfectly with its priority. 

The Impact: Time is of the essence in tech support. By accelerating the triage process, end users' experience reduces frustrations, while tech teams can more efficiently allocate resources to the most critical incidents.

3. Machine Learning-Powered Fraud Detection

Fraudulent activities often leave behind subtle patterns. This team devised a machine learning algorithm capable of identifying these patterns, gauging their likelihood of fraudulence, and alerting dedicated channels for in-depth scrutiny.

The Impact: Trust is paramount in the parcel delivery industry. By leveraging machine learning for fraud detection, we can bolster security measures, safeguard our stakeholders, and foster a safer transaction environment for everyone involved.

The Ripple Effect: Beyond the Code

For each of the projects, the respective team delivered a showcase of their work alongside a demonstration of a prototype. As a testament to the quality of work and the potential of all three projects, all three will be explored further - with a view of implementing them into Parcel2Go’s business.

Tim Rix, Director of Change at Parcel2Go, said after the event: “I found the quality of ideas remarkably high, and the progress made in proving them was fabulous. To have every team produce something that we are going to take forward with meaningful benefit showed great investment and appreciation of the business as well as fantastic thought and application to the task set. The possibilities for future development on these ideas, as shared with us in the presentations, is genuinely exciting”

Rob Devany, Delivery Principal at AND Digital’s club Adams in Leeds, added: “Hackathons are more than just tech showdowns. Bringing together people and creating a shared energy and enthusiasm can be used as a platform for collaboration, a real incubator for team building and a catalyst for innovation. Amidst the frenzy of coding, debugging, and innovating, the participants learn to trust, rely on, and empower each other, cementing bonds that extend beyond professional realms.”

To learn more about AND Digital's approach to Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI), visit our Gen AI page.