The University of Arkansas at Little Rock’s AI Hackathon and HealthTech Startup Week brought together some of Arkansas’ most promising young innovators to explore how artificial intelligence can help address real-world health care challenges.
Held June 8-12 on the UA Little Rock campus, the weeklong event welcomed students from across Arkansas, ages 16-26, for an immersive experience in AI, entrepreneurship, product development and health care innovation. Students were randomly assigned to teams and spent the week working like startup founders, identifying problems, developing solutions, building prototypes and preparing business pitches.
By the end of the week, six student teams had developed fully functioning AI applications, several physical prototypes and pitch presentations focused on health care needs identified by sponsoring organizations.
The grand prize went to Resonate: Music Therapy Access to All for Patients with Dementia & Alzheimer’s, a student-led solution designed to expand access to music therapy for patients living with dementia and Alzheimer’s disease. The team earned the event’s $10,000 grand prize.
BioVentures was proud to serve as a sponsor of the event and support prizes for the winning teams. Eric Peterson, president of BioVentures, also served as a judge for the pitch competition alongside other leaders from Arkansas’ health care, technology and entrepreneurial communities.
The hackathon was hosted in partnership with organizations including BioVentures, Arkansas Children’s and Arkansas Blue Cross and Blue Shield. Additional health care organizations and universities, including UAMS, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Arkansas, Arkansas Children’s, Mainline Health Systems, Inc., and Central Arkansas Veterans Affairs, sponsored challenge topics seeking AI-driven approaches to current health care needs.
Throughout the week, students tackled challenges in areas including next-generation drug testing, early mental health intervention, maternal and infant health in rural Arkansas, support for cancer survivors, Black men’s health, health care coverage navigation and music therapy for older adults.
The program culminated in a Demo-and-Pitch Showcase on June 12 at the UA Little Rock Engineering and Information Technology Auditorium, where teams presented their projects to judges, mentors, community members and industry leaders.
Congratulations to Resonate and to all of the participating teams for an outstanding week of creativity, collaboration and innovation.
