GS Retail Holds Hackathon with GS Group Innovation Community 52g

An employee participating in the GS Retail hackathon event is explaining an idea (Photo by GS Retail).

[Asia Economy Reporter Yuri Kim] GS Retail announced on the 12th that it held the '2021 Hackathon' event, which solicited new business and service ideas for future distribution innovation.

The company stated that this event was conducted with the participation of GS Retail and employees from six GS Group affiliates to establish an internal open innovation culture in line with the launch of the integrated GS Retail. The hackathon was a competition to propose and realize ideas on the themes of ▲ new business or service ideas that can be done with MZ generation (Millennials + Generation Z) customers ▶ ways to utilize data to deliver greater happiness to employees.

In the preliminary round held since August, 37 teams with 139 participants took part. A 'Future Commerce Village' was created on the metaverse platform 'Gather Town,' where each team explained their proposed ideas, conducted customer interviews, and collaborated. Through customer and executive evaluations, 10 teams advanced to the finals.

In the finals held in a separate offline space, practitioners from various roles used no-code tools (programs that allow creating mobile apps and websites without coding) to directly create demonstration products for service validation without developer assistance and tested them with customers. On September 3rd, a presentation was held at the GS Tower 23rd floor lounge and metaverse space, where the business value and feasibility of ideas were evaluated, and the top three teams were awarded.

The first-place team, 'Healthyfolio,' received positive feedback for recommending health functional foods through data analysis, enabling a smart health guide by comparing daily recommended nutrient intake and ingredients of supplements, as well as for its practical feasibility in real life.

Excellent ideas selected in this event will be actively applied to the field through collaboration with GS Retail's dedicated organization. Park Solip, Head of Strategy Division at GS Retail (Executive Director), said, "This event was voluntarily planned and operated by GS Retail and 52g members to promote change within the group," adding, "We will continue to create collaborative opportunities on various themes so that the hackathon can be a starting point for innovation."