6 November 2025
From 27 to 29 October 2025, “TheHackathon: Gomel” was held in Gomel. The event was organized by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), Francisk Skorina Gomel State University (GSU), and startup lab Zborka Labs, with support from Belagroprombank. The challenge was provided by Belorusneft, a national energy company and fuel retailer operating a network of gas stations.
Fourteen teams — over 60 university and college students from across Belarus — participated, demonstrating skills in software development, business analytics, product management, UX and UI design.
Winners:
1st place – Vladislav Kolosov and Maria Zagornikova from GSU; Artem Garbuzov from Gomel State Mechanical Engineering College.
2nd place – Irina Kalinina, Yevgeny Alisievich, Dzmitry Unukouski and Alyaksei Kravchenka from Belarusian State University of Transport.
3rd place – Artem Chekras, Ksenia Karakhanova, Daniil Kononenko and Daniil Marinovich from GSU; Darya Kudrya from Gomel State Agrarian and Economic College.
Participants developed a service ecosystem concept integrating Belorusneft’s existing and new services around car owners’ needs, expanding beyond the transportation sector.
In addition to its core activities in hydrocarbon exploration, refining and sales, Belorusneft is entering new markets: electric vehicle charging stations, agriculture, food services, e-commerce (marketplace), coffee roasting, advertising sales, etc. The company is continuously seeking new niches to diversify revenue streams. However, a key challenge is that Belorusneft’s existing mobile applications operate in isolation, with no integration between them.
Participants at TheHackathon: Gomel proposed a strategy to develop the company’s mobile applications as a unified customer ecosystem, ensuring that the maximum number of current and future services — both in B2C and B2B segments — work together with maximum synergistic effect.
Teams worked on their solutions for two days and presented them to the jury on the third day. Throughout the hackathon, experts from ITU, Zborka Labs, Belorusneft and Belagroprombank conducted training sessions on interface design, business model development, idea generation and effective pitching. Participants received continuous mentorship, including from representatives of the case-providing company.
“Events like TheHackathon: Gomel are a fundamental element in training professionals — their importance is difficult to overstate. They reveal students’ potential in new ways, often unknown even to the students themselves, thereby shaping a new generation of talent, increasing entrepreneurial capacity and developing the national economy,” – noted Alexander Fedortsov, Head of Marketing at RUE Belorusneft.
According to him, he did not expect immediate tangible results from the case — rather, he aimed to observe promising talent.
“The outcomes exceeded my expectations. The organizers managed to gather talented youth capable of tackling any challenge. Much of what we saw will be taken into account in our future projects,” – Alexander Fedortsov noted.
He added that it is difficult to definitively assess specialists during such a short event, but several participants caught his attention.
“We exchanged contacts with some of them right after the event, and I do not rule out seeing them join our company in the future,” – Alexander Fedortsov shared.
Maria Zagornikova, a member of the 1st-place team, believes the case task was quite feasible — the key was to carefully study the brief, and mentors clarified the unclear points. “All the hackathon trainings were rich and engaging — thanks to them, we achieved this result,” – she noted. When asked whether the team prefers starting employment or launching their own startup, the members replied: “In the beginning, it’s better to start working at a company. Later, once you pass a certain salary threshold, you can launch a startup.”
Members of the 2nd-place team, on the contrary, believe launching one’s own startup is very important. Moreover, their team is already working on several such projects.
In Alexander Fedortsov’s view, students may choose different paths, but launching a solution without prior employment experience is an exceptional route — only for young people 100% confident in themselves.
“If there’s even a hint of doubt, then you’re not ready yet, and it’s better to gain experience first. To create a successful product, one must be not only a highly qualified IT specialist, but also an entrepreneur. Many prefer stable employment and gradual growth — and that’s good; otherwise, how would highly skilled teams be formed, combining the expertise of hundreds and thousands of developers to create world-scale products?” – Alexander Fedortsov concluded.
The hackathon’s partners were the youth entrepreneurship communities Startup Space and Igrow. The ITU and Zborka Labs competition series “TheHackathon”, focused on creating IT solutions for businesses, has now been held twice. The first event — TheHackathon: AI ERA — took place in Minsk in September 2025. Participants received one of two cases from major companies: Beltelecom or Wildberries & Russ.
Winning teams came from Belarusian State University and the Academy of the Ministry of Internal Affairs.
|