ASU students work with Silicon Valley Bank to create fintech solutions

When ASU students gather with industry experts, new technologies and upskilling opportunities, nearly anything is possible.

As was the case during a recent hackathon with ASU’s Fulton Schools of Engineering and the University Technology Office (UTO), in partnership with Silicon Valley Bank (SVB). SVB is the financial partner of the innovation economy with a core focus of helping innovators, enterprises and investors move their ideas forward. 

Close to 50 ASU students came together with university and industry leaders to explore new solutions that address some of the most pressing challenges facing the financial technology (fintech) industry, as well as explore new career pathways possible after graduation.

“This hackathon is just the start of how we get our students engaged in technology with local partners, such as SVB, and create pathways to future career opportunities,” said Kyle Squires, Dean and Vice Provost of Fulton Schools of Engineering.  

“This hackathon is just the start of how we get our students engaged in technology with local partners and create pathways to future career opportunities.

Kyle Squires, Dean and Vice Provost of ASU's Fulton Schools of Engineering

John Rome, Deputy CIO at UTO explained the mutual value that these types of events provide: “Hackathons are increadingly popular formats as they not only provide students hands-on learning experiences with industry experts, they also offer the partner organization with a diversity of thought on how to tackle challenges.” This is valuable to companies as today’s learners are the next generation of leaders and consumers. 

Hackathon-style event surfaces ideas from leaders of the future 

Using the hackathon format, ASU students from Fulton Schools of Engineering – studying computer programming, engineering, software development – as well as cross-disciplinary students, worked together in teams with business experts from SVB over the course of three days.

On day one, students filed into the Novus Innovation Corridor with laptops in hands, eager to begin the competition. The weekend kicked off with a few quick insights from the engineering team at SVB. They gave an overview of the types of needs that their customers have, as well as opened questions to students about what could be created to give customers a better experience. 

So what was the task at hand? Students were asked to design solutions that would enhance SVB’s interactions with customers. To do so, students were invited to solve one of the two opportunity statements SVB created around customer service, including: 

  • Build an innovative or new way to interact in real time with Silicon Valley Bank 
     
  • Explore what tools can be used to collect and display these interactions to help SVB make better real-time decisions

Students organized into 10 teams to compete in the hackathon. Naveen Kumar, who is pursuing his master’s at Fulton Schools, reflected on the experience as part of team Zion: “The hackathon required us to build a solution that helps SVB make personal financial decisions on the spot – they wanted to see new, innovative ways to enhance real interaction between SVB and its customers.”

At the end of day one, students got to work with mentors from SVB and ASU’s Fulton Schools of Engineering to begin exploring potential solutions, with mini-lessons on how to incorporate Amazon Web Services (AWS) cloud tools in their design from UTO. Teams would be scored on their innovative approaches and demonstration of their fintech idea. 

“After coding non-stop for about 20 hours, we ended up implementing an end-to-end platform prototype that could automate the process of predicting success in lending loans and connecting startup clients to potential investors,” Kumar continued. 

Teams pitch their ideas for fintech solutions

Students were focused as they honed their pitches for day three. Following the ten-minute pitch presentations, Ryan Hendrix, host of the event and General Manager for ASU’s Cloud Innovation Center, noted “the students absolutely exceeded my expectations with what they came up with and the questions they asked, making sure to talk to the SVB engineers about background on current challenges. These students were really listening to customer needs much like they would in the fintech industry.” 

On the strength of their pitches, three teams won scholarships for their ideas. Winning teams included Insights, Zion and Seedit. Here’s a look at their solutions:  

 In first place was Insights, which developed a tool that would provide startup founders with financial data in real time. Using advanced technologies at the intersection of artificial intelligence (AI), natural language processing and data retrieval, this tool is designed to be fast, reliable and an invaluable aid to the upcoming startup founder. Each team member received $5,000. 

Team Zion was the runner up. The team designed a platform for startups and venture capitalists (VC) to connect with each other. On the back end, was a full stack application for automating that matches VCs with startups and promoting startup banking extensively. Second place team members earned $3,000.

“This hackathon required a wide variety of skills,” said Risabh Raj, part of team Zion and recent graduate from Fulton Schools Master’s program. “Most of our team had previously taken a cloud computing and machine learning course at Fulton which prepared us on how to design, develop, and manage a complex application,” Raj continued. 

Most of our team had previously taken a cloud computing and machine learning course at Fulton which prepared us on how to design, develop, and manage a complex application.

Risabh Raj, graduate from ASU Fulton Schools of Engineering

Through the use of social media platforms, Seedit is designed to identify promising startups and analyze their investment potential. It is achieved through a combination of AI and a ranking system developed called "silicon score". This third place team each walked away with $2,000 each. 

Each of the winning teams are invited to apply for internship opportunities with SVB and ASU.  

Today’s hackathon is tomorrow's pathway for students

Hackathons provide value to the university, organizations and, most importantly, students. By partnering with local organizations, students are able to apply their studies to real world scenarios, while upskilling with industry experts and exploring possible career opportunities. Meanwhile, partners like SVB gain new insights on how to address challenges or opportunities, as well as create a pipeline to highly qualified graduates. 

Together, these partnerships are fueling innovation at ASU and beyond. 

David Flores, Head of Global Banking Technology at SVB, reflected on the shared value of these hackathons: “It’s no secret that ASU produces a number of highly qualified students, and with our hiring goals at SVB, partnering with ASU in events like this hackathon just makes sense to create student pathways into careers.”


Many thanks to the mentors, judges and partners for dedicating their time and expertise:

From SVB: Gurjeet Sandhu, Mark Rohrwasser, Sundhar Subramanian, Arul Chandrasekaran, Brady Stevenson, Mike Humphries, David Flores, Geoff Miller, Jessie Bradford, Thomas Whiting, Brenda Curtis, Meghan Blair, Sandeep Bose Krishna Ramakrishnan and Pankaj Iain

From ASU: John Rome, Melissa Stine, David Wahls, Kati Martinez, Kyle Squires, Josh Levine, Matthew De la Rosa, Ryan Hendrix and Bonnie Wilde

From AWS: Lorena Costanza, Aditya Challa