Hi-Tech Park hosts the finals of the Space Hackathon with MTBank

On April 22 - 24, 2025 another large-scale competition of digital ideas - Space Hackathon with MTBank - was held at HTP business incubator.

The hackathon was organized by the Belarusian State University, MTBank and Hi-Tech Park.

More than 170 students of higher educational institutions of Belarus participated in the event. During three days the contestants were to develop a solution making the “Halva” card more attracktive for the users in the age span of 18-35 years old.

16 teams out of 41 participated in the finals of the hackathon, which took place at HTP on April 24.

Opening the official part, Dmitry Mikulko, head of the HTP startup center, noted that the practice of holding hackathons is expanding. Hi-Tech Park continues to be the point of attraction for new talents. “We believe that you are the future of our country and we will do everything to give you ample opportunities to realize your potential in Belarus,” he addressed the finalists.

Chairman of the Board of MTBank Dmitry Shidlovich expressed confidence that many of the solutions presented at the finals would soon appear in the Belarusian banking market.

The finalists presented to the expert jury creative ideas of card design, proposals for new features of its functionality, non-standard solutions with gamification elements and much more.

Sharing the impressions of the competition, Maria Podvitelskaya (a student of BSEU) noted: “Hackathon is people, emotions and complete immersion in the process”. 

Closing the event, the BSU First Vice-Rector Dmitry Kurlovich expressed his gratitude to all the contestants for their participation in this movement, as well as to Hi-Tech Park for providing the venue for the hackathon.

Pavel Nasevich (a BSUIR student) received the winner's diploma of Space Hackathon with MTBank. Pavel proposed new functions for the bank's mobile application.

Presenting the award, Chairman of the Management Board of MTBank Dmitry Shidlovitch emphasized that Hi-Tech Park is an amazing space where it is easy and comfortable to discuss very important issues, and also noted the role of Belarusian State University as a conductor of startup movement in the country. 

Along with the award D. Shidlovich offered the winner of the contest to start a professional career in MTBank.

The second place went to Alexey Doroshchenko's team (BSU students). The participants came up with an idea to implement an innovative solution using neural networks to attract a new young audience.

The third in the list of winners was the team of Alexander Lebedev (students of BSUIR, BSTU), who presented a project to modernize the banking application with new benefits for the audience of 18-35 years old.

Congratulating the winners, Alexander Prikhodko, Head of the bank's retail products and processes department, expressed confidence that many of the ideas presented in the finals can be implemented: "My expectations have been far exceeded. Both the level of presentations and the depth of the contestants' ideas are impressive. This shows that the student movement is not standing still."

Separately, Tatyana Samoilenko, independent director, member of the supervisory board of MTBank, invited several finalist teams to continue cooperation with the bank in developing the ideas they proposed during the hackathon. “It was as difficult to determine the winners as to choose the best of the best,” commented T. Samoilenko on the results of the competition.

The special prize of MTBank to the most creative PR-blogger of the hackathon was awarded to Victoria Bobko (a student of BSUIR).