AUSTIN, Texas--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Vista Equity Partners (“Vista”), a leading global investment firm focused exclusively on enterprise software, data and technology-enabled businesses, today announced the winners of its 6th Annual Global Hackathon. The portfolio-wide business innovation competition provided an opportunity for developers and engineers to connect with peers from around the world and compete to advance enterprise software solutions with generative AI.
This year’s hackathon featured over 130 participants on 30 teams from dozens of Vista portfolio companies. New to the competition, Vista welcomed students from Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) including Morehouse College, Bowie State University, Virginia State University and Virginia Union. These students joined individual portfolio company teams and worked to build innovative enterprise software solutions, providing hands on experience and strengthening their knowledge and expertise.
These teams of developers, engineers and students explored how generative AI’s emerging capabilities have the potential to transform the future of enterprise software and create solutions that are not only commercially viable and drive customer value, but are developed in an ethical, transparent and accountable manner. Learn more about the competition and how Vista partners with developers from across its portfolio, here.
“Generative AI holds the potential to propel enterprise software forward, enhancing both product development and innovation,” said Robert F. Smith, Founder, Chairman and CEO of Vista Equity Partners. “By harnessing talent and learnings from across Vista’s global portfolio, we can encourage responsible innovation and accelerate generative AI use cases for our companies. It was an honor to welcome the talented students from the HBCUs who participated in this year’s hackathon, giving them a head start in leveraging emerging technology to shape the next generation of enterprise software.”
Vista would like to congratulate the winners of this year’s North America competition in the following categories:
PowerSchool: Best Overall. PowerSchool’s solution consists of an AI-assisted tutor that can help to personalize a student’s learning path.
Poppulo: Peer Choice. Poppulo's solution develops a more efficient content creation process, using AI to dynamically generate templates, text and media.
mabl: Most Disruptive. Mabl’s solution reduces the effort during automated browser, API and mobile web test creation by using generative AI to guide users through the test creation process, automatically integrating best practices.
Pluralsight: Best Business Idea. Pluralsight’s solution leverages generative AI to help users create learning journeys that directly address their personal and organizational upskilling needs.
Jamf: Best Engineering. Jamf’s solution uses AI and Large Language Model (LLM) to empower IT and security teams to more effectively identify and contextualize malicious events across Apple and mobile devices.
Avalara: Best Operational Efficiency. Avalara’s AI-powered solution allows business leaders, employees and customer facing teams to pool information from multiple sources and media types to keep teams in sync.
All entries were reviewed by a panel of Vista value creation and product and technology experts. Submissions were judged based on innovation and originality, feasibility of productization and deployment, potential business impact, completeness of vision and clarity of presentation.
About Vista Equity Partners
Vista is a leading global investment firm with more than $100 billion in assets under management as of March 31, 2023. The firm exclusively invests in enterprise software, data and technology-enabled organizations across private equity, permanent capital, credit and public equity strategies, bringing an approach that prioritizes creating enduring market value for the benefit of its global ecosystem of investors, companies, customers and employees. Vista's investments are anchored by a sizable long-term capital base, experience in structuring technology-oriented transactions and proven, flexible management techniques that drive sustainable growth. Vista believes the transformative power of technology is the key to an even better future – a healthier planet, a smarter economy, a diverse and inclusive community and a broader path to prosperity. Further information is available at vistaequitypartners.com. Follow Vista on LinkedIn, @Vista Equity Partners, and on Twitter, @Vista_Equity.
