Problem

Mintbean was a hackathon platform that connected developers with companies who wanted to hire them. It did so using an innovative hackathon-based vetting and proof-of-skill system.

Commercial hackathon hosting systems were very expensive at the time, and didn't fully cater to the needs of 100% remote hackathon communities. We needed a way to announce hackathons when they happened, provide marketing and logistical information to our community, provide hackathon challenge instrucitons, and provide a place where the community could submit their hackathon projects and show them off on social media.

Solution

I built a full-stack SaaS platform using React, Typescript, Node, Postgres, AWS, and other technologies. In order to develop the platform faster and on a budget, I also created a junior developer apprenticeship program where I would hire junior developers and train them on the job.

Impact

We hosted 100+ hackathons in 2.5 years, with literally hundreds of online workshops and a community of thousands of software developers. At peak, we had 10,000+ software developers on the platform. The apprenticeship program graduated 15+ junior developers who went on to work at companies like Postman, Shopify, Charter Communications, and more.