Intwana Yase Kasi – Innovation Challenge 2026 Create. Build. Represent the Kasi. The Intwana Yase Kasi – Innovation Challenge 2026 is a beginner-friendly innovation hackathon designed to empower township youth, creatives, and aspiring technologists to solve real-world problems through technology, art, and creative thinking. This challenge focuses on everyday issues faced in townships and local communities such as transport, safety, events, small businesses, education, and creative economies and encourages participants to build practical, meaningful, and culturally relevant solutions. The hackathon is structured as a “slow hack”, giving beginners enough time to learn, experiment, and build confidently, while still maintaining professional standards for submissions and evaluation.
Open to students, recent graduates, self-taught learners, and beginners
Open to participants from South Africa and beyond
Individual participants or teams of 1–4 members
No prior hackathon experience required
Artists, designers, developers, and creatives are all welcome
Participants are encouraged to build projects across one or more of the following tracks:
Websites, web apps, mobile apps
Simple tools, platforms, bots, or dashboards
Visual design concepts
Music, sound, or media-based digital experiences
Creative storytelling platforms
Tools for schools, spaza shops, NGOs, event organisers
Solutions addressing safety, transport, gigs, or local services
Projects do not need to be fully commercial products, working prototypes and strong concepts are encouraged.
Hands-on experience solving real community problems
A portfolio-ready project for your CV, GitHub, or personal website
Feedback from mentors and judges
Recognition from Intwana Yase Kasi
Certificates and public exposure on Intwana platforms
Experience working in teams, pitching ideas, and presenting solutions
Online
Intwana Yase Kasi
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