Pipedrive spends Easter solving COVID-19 challenges at The Global Hack

CTO Sergei Anikin elected as the education track lead

New York - 7 April 2020 - Pipedrive joins forces with over a million people across the world to solve challenges related to COVID-19 at The Global Hack, the biggest virtual hackathon ever held from 9 to 12 of April. CTO Sergei Anikin was elected to lead the education track, guiding mentors of around 300 teams in developing future solutions for teaching and learning.

Sergei Anikin, CTO of Pipedrive, said that in spite of the current difficulties, the decision to support such a large-scale global effort came fast for Pipedrive. “COVID-19 is a global problem that affects all of us and we have to fight against it globally. We all want the crisis to end as fast and with the smallest possible damages. I am positive that these 3,300 international teams at the global hackathon will come up with top-notch solutions that alleviate the severe social and economic issues we are facing today and will have after the immediate crisis is over.”

The Global Hack has 11 tracks inspired by the UN sustainability goals: arts and creativity, crisis response, economy, education, environment, governance, empowerment, health and wellness, media and entertainment, mental health, solidarity in action, and work. Each of the tracks have world-class leads, starting with Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, Toomas Henrik Ilves, former president of Estonia, Steve Jurvetson, Board Member of SpaceX and Tesla, and public health specialist Khaliya Aga Khan. Pipedrive CTO Sergei Anikin will lead the education track. “As a father of three, I can tell from my own experience that shutting down schools has caused an enormous burden on teachers, students, schools as well as parents who have to find means to support home-schooling. I am excited to contribute to developing tools for teachers and students that are effective and easy to use during this new normal.”

Besides Anikin, a number of Pipedrive’s top managers have signed up as mentors, including Martti Kuldma, VP of Engineering, who will serve as a team mentor for work track, and Janis Rozenblats, VP of Product, who has signed up as a response mentor.

Kai Isand, head organizer of The Global Hack, said: “This is our call to hack the crisis – not only to brainstorm solutions to prevent and stop the spreading of a highly-infectious disease but to think about how our lives will be different after this. To discuss how it will change the way we move, build, learn and connect. To see new opportunities. To build the new normal. By now over 47 countries have organised their own local hackathons. The next step for the global movement is to come together in a unified hackathon event where teams will create projects that have a strong international socio-economic impact and create the needed rapid change.”

Marko Russiver, hackathon organizer and mentor, added, “We hack for love. We hack for the people we don’t know and will never meet. We hack for the first responders, the grandmothers, the newborns, boomers, and the millennials. We hack for the future where you don’t have to be afraid. We hack because we are all living in one small village in this new world. We are not European, American, African, or Asian. We are human. And we will hack, because we humans love.”

The Global Hack is a global initiative which unites the Hack the Crisis movement and the 40+ hackathons put on in the framework of this movement. The core initiative comes from enthusiasts at Garage 48, Accelerate Estonia, and Guaana, who organized the very first hackathon in just six hours from 13 to 15 of March in Estonia.

The hackathon will take place from 9 to 12 April. The participants have 48 hours to collaborate and build a solution within their tracks. The prize pool for the best ideas will be at least 120,000 euros.

About Pipedrive Inc.
Founded in 2010, Pipedrive is the first CRM platform developed from the salesperson's point of view. Today, Pipedrive is used by sales teams at more than 90,000 companies worldwide. Pipedrive is the top-rated CRM and has offices in Dublin; Lisbon; London; New York; Prague; Riga, Latvia; Tampa/St. Pete; and Tallinn and Tartu, Estonia. Learn more at Pipedrive.com.

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