Hackathon rules, multiple awards and cross-sell ideas: how Vroozi runs internal hackathons to keep innovating
Shaz Khan · Vroozi
Published September 1, 2022Shaz Khan, CEO of Vroozi, shares:
- Why they invested in a hackathon
- Their hackathon rules
- How to set one up at your company
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Shaz Khan shares Vroozi’s internal-hackathon playbook: sustain founder-led innovation, give teams room to experiment with clear rules, use multiple awards, turn ideas into customer value, and make collaboration work across locations.
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“everything from digital purchasing on your smartphone you can get a boom mic you can get shelving units you can get helicopter rides um you name it it runs through our platform and then we actually pay suppliers digitally so in Corporate America a lot of people are paying by checks still so we actually digitize payments through ACH virtual cards and a number of other mediums and then we sit on top of any type of financial platform that you can”
“they'll nap at their desks we obviously staff them up with whatever they need stock them up with whatever they need pizzas sodas maybe some other Libations if they feel successful and it's a lot of fun um slack channels booming up a lot of animated conversations a lot of profanity um it's a it's a great great way to uh basically deliver innovation in your”
“we talk about Innovation is your idea interesting cool pitch how well did you present it the pitches are 10 minutes max if you go over you get you get dinged so again we run a pretty tight ship because if you can imagine evaluating in a four to six committee it's about six hours over a zoom and it's really really tenuous so”
“means is that when you actually buy something for your company it's going to typically get coded to a GL account right you don't know what that GL account is right so what this uh hackathon proved was the ability to take a description of what you were buying and auto code it to the right GL from a financial standpoint which was great from a controller standpoint these guys put it together in about two days and um the hackathon one we basically did”
“and pay in terms of cash um cash prizes can uh go uh starting at a thousand dollars and kind of trickle down to 500 250. um but um each team member gets gets the cash price yeah um I can uh I can share with you guys yeah it's uh do I have it on here let me see that's a good point there it is right there all right thank you so much yeah I'm sorry”
“Vroozi provides an autonomous spend management and invoice payments platform that allows companies go digital within weeks with no friction or disruption to existing ERP systems”
“A hackathon is an event, usually hosted by a tech company or organization, where programmers get together for a short period of time to collaborate on a project.”
“Scoring Criteria is from 1 to 10 (highest) across four major categories:”
“Machine Learning for Accounting Objects”
“Provide a framework and rule set for the hackathon – Email me if you want a Word document of the Vroozi Hackathon and sample scoring sheet”
Video
How Vroozi leveraged two internal hackathons last year to add $1M new ARR - Slide Deck
Shaz Khan serves as the CEO and Co-Founder of Vroozi, where he looks after the creation and implementation of innovative e-commerce and marketplace solutions tailored to streamline B2B sourcing and procurement processes. His focus is on developing user-friendly platforms that are adaptable across diverse industries and geographic locations, accessible through various devices.
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Each slide with a short explanation of what it shows. Open the slide text for its exact wording.
21 passages
How Vroozi leveraged two internal hackathons to achieve $1M new ARR August 2022
Vroozi presents itself as an autonomous spend management and invoice payments platform that can be deployed without disrupting existing ERP systems. The slide reports 55 customers, 30K users, $6B in annual throughput, revenue above $5M, and operations in 15 countries.
Company Vroozi provides an autonomous spend management and invoice payments platform that allows companies go digital within weeks with no friction or disruption to existing ERP systems 55 Customers $6B Annual Throughput >$5M Revenue 15 Countries 30K Users
The platform connects digital purchasing, invoice processing, and supplier payments in one procure-to-pay flow. The slide highlights workflow approvals, OCR and machine learning for invoice coding, electronic payments, analytics, and integrations across enterprise and mid-market systems.
Autonomous Procure to Pay Digital Purchasing Purchase from digital marketplace on any device Business rules engine and workflow approvals Electronic connection and document exchange Smart financial coding and categorization Digital Invoicing Cognitive OCR technology for invoice processing Continuous machine learning algorithms for coding and fraud reduction 2/3-way match of PO, Goods Receipt, and Invoice Supplier portal Digital Payments Pay on-time to correct vendor Reduce paper checks and increase electronic ACH, wires, and virtual cards Eliminate supplier inquiry calls for payments Real-Time Analytics Artificial Intelligence Engine StandardIntegrations Mobile and Multi-Device Unified Platform ENTERPRISE MID-MARKET
Customer logos are grouped across enterprise, mid-market, and GPO segments. The range of organizations illustrates the different customer tiers Vroozi serves.
Customers ENTERPRISE MID-MARKET GPO
This section asks how a company can keep innovating over time. It frames the need for a repeatable way to generate ideas beyond existing routines.
Dilemma How do we find ways to continuously innovate as a company?
The slide lists seven usual inputs for innovation: founder ideas, client reviews, product owners, competitors, focus groups, user groups, and white papers. These are the established channels the talk will look beyond.
Usual Suspects Founder-Led Ideas Client Business Reviews Product Owners Competition Focus Groups User Groups White Papers
A hackathon brings programmers together for a focused project. The slide describes the format as a fast-paced event completed in 72 hours or less.
Hackathon A hackathon is an event, usually hosted by a tech company or organization, where programmers get together for a short period of time to collaborate on a project. Hackathons are fast paced with team members completing projects in 72 hours or less with very little sleep, lots of coffee, and animated conversations.
Vroozi’s framework keeps teams small and the event time-boxed: teams have 1 to 4 people, work for 3 business days, and meet twice a year. Cash prizes reward winners, while product owners can advise teams without limiting who joins.
Vroozi Hackathon Framework Team Minimum: 1 person Maximum: 4 people Name Your team Duration 3 business days Events are twice a year Prizes Cash prizes provided to winners Team Combination No restrictions. Dev, QA and OPS can mix and match based on what/who they are comfortable with. Product owners are welcome to join a team as an advisory member to bounce ideas off of, or serve as project advisors to multiple teams throughout the hackathon.
Teams may choose their technology and project, with credit required for third-party tools and libraries. They submit working code with instructions and a presentation of no more than 10 minutes; overruns lose points.
Vroozi Hackathon Rules Technology No technology limitation. Feel free to explore/implement in the technology of your choice. Libraries and Tools If you use third party libraries to build your solution, please clearly credit them. Do not take ownership of someone else’s work. Failure to do so will result in automatic disqualification. Topics No restrictions on what you want to work on. Your team will NOT be judged on how your project can be used internally at Vroozi. We want to allow complete freedom in choosing technology and project/problem. What to Submit Working code + README/instructions Presentation (no more than 10 minutes) - Points will be deducted for presentations that overrun.
A committee of 4 to 6 team members looks for ideas that are clever, innovative, and impressive to prototype in 2 to 3 days. The evaluation favors a strong idea, execution, and presentation.
Judging Judging Committee is made up of four to six team members What judges are looking for: Something cool, clever, and innovative. Think outside the box to impress the judges. Show them something that they probably had not thought of as being possible, or even if they did, they thought it was not possible to prototype it in 2-3 days. Wow the judges with your idea/execution/presentation to win top marks!
Judges score each project from 1 to 10 across innovation, pitch, value, and execution. Together, the criteria assess whether the idea is distinctive, clearly presented, solves a defined problem, and matches the working result.
Scoring Criteria Scoring Criteria is from 1 to 10 (highest) across four major categories: INNOVATION: Is your idea interesting/cool/innovative? PITCH: How well did you present it? Pitching the idea is as important as designing/implementing it. VALUE: Is your idea solving a problem? Did you clearly identify a problem? How well did you solve it? EXECUTION: How close did the working project come to what the team was pitching or trying to solve?
The scoring sheet totals put JaroSam and Innovation Hub level at 155 points, ahead of Creative Chaos at 142 and Bit Hunters at 126. The table shows five judges scoring teams across the same criteria.
Scoring Sheet Snippet Judge Callback Assassins Desk Demons (QA) JaroSam Innovation Hub Judge #1 30 25 35 33 Judge #2 23 20 32 28 Judge #3 24 20 33 30 Judge #4 32 21 23 30 Judge #5 30 27 32 34 139 113 155 155 Bit Hunters Creative Chaos 27 23 23 29 22 28 27 31 27 31 126 142
Awards recognize creativity, value, presentation, technical complexity, business viability, QA, and an engineers’ choice. A team can win in up to three categories.
Prize Categories Same team can win in up to three (3) categories MOST INNOVATIVE/CREATIVE IDEA MOST VALUE (solution to a target problem) BEST PRESENTATION MOST COMPLEX/TECHNICALLY CHALLENGING MOST LIKELY TO BE BUSINESS VIABLE BEST AMONGST QA ENGINEERS' CHOICE AWARD (will be voted on by participants of the hackathon)
Top teams receive cash awards based on accumulated points, with separate awards for category winners. Projects that reach the Vroozi roadmap can earn a bonus cash award, alongside certificates and recognition.
Prizes Cash Awards for First, Second, and Third Place Teams based on total points accumulated Awards for category winners Bonus cash award for any hackathon project that makes it to the Vroozi Roadmap Certificates Infinite bragging rights
The first hackathon, held in Dec 2019, selected JaroSam’s machine-learning project as the best overall. The project applied models to suggest accounting information, and the diagram shows a deployment path connecting internal services, an API gateway, Lambda, and SageMaker.
First Hackathon Result First Hackathon Conducted in Dec 2019 Best Overall Project: Application of Machine Learning models to auto-suggest accounting information Team Name: JaroSam
The timeline connects two hackathon projects to a production module: accounting-object machine learning in Dec 2019, smart administration in Dec 2020, and the Vroozi Intelligence Module release in Dec 2021.
Bringing Concept to Reality Production Release Vroozi Intelligence Module Dec 2021 Hackathon #2 Smart Administration Dec 2020 Hackathon #1 Machine Learning for Accounting Objects Dec 2019
Supplier invoices enter through portals, electronic formats, email, or mailed and faxed documents that a capture partner scans. Vroozi Intelligence then combines cognitive data capture and AI/ML with optional human review, matching, exception workflows, posting, and ERP payment integration.
Vroozi Invoice to Pay Process with Vroozi Intelligence PO Flip or Web Invoice Upload Portal Electronic Invoice cXML / EDI810 Email with Invoice Attached as PDF Supplier mails or faxes invoice Vroozi Outsourced Capture Partner (Mail Room, Scanning) Exception Handling and Approval Workflows INTEGRATION Invoice Posting ERP Payment Provider Invoice sent to ERP for payment Supplier Matching & Coding HITL (optional) Vroozi Intelligence Combining Cognitive Data Capture and AI/ML + Complete Automation Scan and Capture
The comparison contrasts manual entry, which can take up to 20 minutes per invoice with exception rates up to 25% higher, against automated extraction that takes 15 to 30 seconds and brings the exception rate below 5%. The slide summarizes the difference as up to 40x faster processing, with line-item population and fraud detection included.
Without Vroozi Manual data entry Up to 20 mins to process single invoice No line-item detail Up to 25% higher exception rate No fraud or duplicate invoice detection Multiple approvers to chase down With Vroozi Intelligent data extraction 15 - 30 secs to process invoice Auto-population of line-item data Exception rate to below 5% Built-in fraud and duplicate invoice detection Up to 40x Faster Digital Invoice Processing = Cognitive OCR
The slide connects adoption of Vroozi Intelligence with $1M in new ARR from invoice and intelligence sales. It reports a five-customer limited beta, 50% cross-sell among existing invoice customers, and inclusion in 100% of new deals.
Fastest Growing Use Case for Customers Vroozi Intelligence provides the ability to process, approve, and pay incoming supplier invoices with zero human touch Sales Strategy Limited Beta Release in Summer 2021 with five (5) customers New pricing model for Vroozi Invoice customers to add Vroozi Intelligence Cross-Sell - 50% of existing Vroozi Invoice customers subscribed to new module New Customers – 100% of new deals include Vroozi Intelligence priced in $1M New ARR with Invoice + Intelligence
The closing advice is to provide a framework, assign one or two coordinators, and run the event as a team-building exercise. Hackathons can also tackle operations, customer success, sales, and marketing, not only coding.
Key Takeaways Provide a framework and rule set for the hackathon – Email me if you want a Word document of the Vroozi Hackathon and sample scoring sheet Designate one or two individuals to coordinate and run the hackathon Run a Hackathon! – It’s a great teambuilding activity that instills a lot of pride of ownership and achievement Hackathons do not need to be limited to coding exercises only; expand the concept to improving operations, customer success, sales, marketing, etc.
Shaz Khan closes by thanking the audience and inviting them to get in touch for a hackathon framework and sample scoring sheet. The final slide positions Vroozi around spend management and accounts-payable invoice automation.
Thank You SHAZ KHAN – CEO [redacted email] SPEND MANAGEMENT AND AP INVOICE AUTOMATION FOR THE MODERN ENTERPRISE
