Hackathons for Corporate Innovation – a Longitudinal Study

Abstract

Hackathons are increasingly popular means for fostering corporate innovation. Despite abundant research on hackathons, outcomes of corporate hackathons are not as well under-stood. We studied 2 editions of a multi-site internal corporate hackathon series to find aspects affecting project continuation in a corporate setting using observations, surveys and interviews. The study also explored differences between the 2 events and their effect on the projects and teams. The research studied connections between project continuation and team member’s location in the context of cross-site teams. We found multiple aspects that possibly affect project continuation, including preparation, projects relation to existing assets and delivering functional prototypes. We also saw some changes between the hackathons affecting project continuation and participant’s perception of the event. Finally, we found indication that having a multi-site hackathon team may not influence project continuation.