Chennai, April 2023: India’s leading Blockchain and Web 3.0 education pioneer, IBC Media’s Alt Hack – Chennai edition, a third in the series, concluded successfully at Anna University, Guindy this weekend.  The 8-day on-ground education boot camp, conducted in association with the Government of Tamil Nadu and the Tamil Nadu Skill Board, was part of the IBC Internship Program designed specifically for student developers to transition from Web 2.0 to Web 3.0 seamlessly and subsequently build their future in this space.

From a total number of registrations of 2716 students from Tamil Nadu, 560 distinct students participated offline in IBC Alt Hack – Chennai. Out of which, 354 students forming 118 teams will get industry internships from global companies like Polkadot, Chingari and Unique Network. The remaining students will participate in the IBC Online Education Program for industry internships.             

The full-cycle training program was holistic in its approach, facilitating students from across the city to avail free education and certification, practical learning, business ideation process and guidance from top mentors in the field to help them be conversant in Web 3.0, Blockchain and other new-age technologies, come up with relevant business problems and solutioning, and become industry-ready professionals. At the same time, the association with the Tamil Nadu Skill Board further augmented the program, making it a significant opportunity for students with benefits like grants, high-paying jobs and opportunities to bring their Web 3.0 ideas and MVPs to successful outcomes. 

In the 8 days of the education boot camp, the students were trained in relevant aspects of Blockchain and emerging technologies as well as Web 3.0-related careers by IBC Media along with key thought leaders in the industry via impactful and value-driven sessions. Furthermore, IBC Media’s headline sponsor, Polkadot – a flagship project of Web3 Foundation and Parity Technologies, which facilitates a fully-functional and user-friendly decentralised web – gave students an overview of the Polkadot environment architecture and its functional ecosystem. Online speakers from Polkadot included Bill Laboon (Head of Education and Grants at Web3 Foundation), Abhishek Shah(Polkadot Application Engineer at Parity Technologies), Ben Greenberg (Senior Developer Relations Engineer at Parity Technologies) and Urban Osvald (Developer Relations, Engagement Team Lead at Parity Technologies).

With a massive response in terms of student participation, Alt Hack – Chennai witnessed 1789 new ideas and proposals utilising Web 3.0 and Blockchain generated. 14 teams with the best ideas were selected, and 3 winning teams were declared. The winning teams were awarded certificates by IBC Media.

Meanwhile, the final day of the hackathon event also saw the presence of respected Dr M Jayaprakasan (I.S.D.S., CEO – Naan Mudhalvan), along with delegates from leading engineering colleges in Tamil Nadu closely associated with Alt Hack – Chennai. The online speaker line-up included leading minds from the Web 3.0 and Blockchain industry, such as Dr Prakash Kamraj (Lead Blockchain Architect from Chingari) and Urban Osvald from Parity Technologies. An immersive panel discussion on “How does upskilling in emerging tech benefit both recruiters and talent?” was part of the agenda, and the panellists included Ms Mathi Vathani (Associate Vice President, Tamil Nadu Guidance Cell) Professor Senthil Kumar (Vice Principal, Saveetha Engineering College), Mr Pritam (Chennai DAO), Mr Mohan Raja (Director of Touchwork Designs Pvt Ltd), and Mr Vignesh Babu (Co-founder of Print 2 Block), with Praveen Thakur (COO, IBC Media) as the moderator.

Respected Dr M Jayaprakasan, I.S.D.S. (CEO – Naan Mudhalvan) said “IBC Media is announcing a total of 150+ Grants, amounting to INR 48 Lakhs for it to be distributed amongst 118 teams from across the State of Tamil Nadu who participated in IBC Alt Hack – Chennai on ground program. Successful completion of their internship will make them eligible for applying for IBC Startup Pitch Competition with grants over INR 80 lakhs.”