Jeddah, Saudi Arabia
In a landmark achievement for the Kingdom’s innovators and scientists, Saudi Arabia has made its first-ever appearance at the world’s largest healthcare hackathon run by the Harvard Health Systems Innovation Laboratory. This year’s sixth event was themed “Building High-Value Health Systems: Leveraging Artificial Intelligence”.
The hackathon was held simultaneously on 11-12 April across 19 cities worldwide and with more than 3000 contestants from Latin America to Australia. In the Kingdom, over 200 healthcare and business professionals convened at the Sulaiman Al-Habib Medical Complex in Jeddah. Saudi Arabia, though participating for the first time, emerged as the fifth largest hub globally, highlighting the Kingdom’s growing prominence in global healthcare innovation.
Dr Yasser Bhatti, Academic Director at the Prince Mohammed bin Salman College of Business (MBSC), initiated the effort but attributes its success to the strength of public-private partnerships in the Kingdom’s innovation ecosystem. Bhatti said, “At first I thought we would organize this for our community at MBSC, but it just became bigger and bigger as unreserved support was offered by PATH (a US-based healthcare organization), the Sulaiman Al-Habib Medical Group Academy, the Research and Development Authority, and Arbaa’ Marketing”. He further added, “Just as we are all collectively responsible for our health and well-being, this KSA healthcare innovation hub and its success belongs to everyone in the Kingdom.”
The local hub featured 28 teams from all corners of the Kingdom, with 13 teams advancing to the final pitching round. The winners represent prestigious organizations including MBS College of Business, Al-Maarefa University, Al-Jouf University, University of Jeddah, King Abdulaziz University, King Saud bin Abdulaziz University for Health Sciences, King Faisal Specialist and Research Hospital, and National Guard Hospital, among others. These teams exemplify the interdisciplinary collaboration that the hackathon aimed to foster, bringing together expertise from various fields to address pressing healthcare challenges through innovative solutions.
The three winning teams from Saudi Arabia — Physaio, Epileptotrack, MndAI — will now advance to compete against other country winners in the Harvard Venture Bootcamp and Incubator program. They will represent the Kingdom on the global stage and for a chance to scale-up Saudi solutions to the world.
Dr Abdulrhman Almohammedi, a MBSC alumnus and Academic & Public Affairs Manager at SHMG, said, “The competition could not have been executed at such a large scale without the support of more than 30 highly regarded professionals who served as mentors and judges, as well as countless other innovation champions. Next year we look forward to making it even bigger!”
Mr. Yasser Joharji, the CEO of Al-Nahdi Medical Company, delivered the global keynote address, complemented by four additional speakers and an insightful panel discussion on the future of healthcare innovation in the Kingdom.
This global representation of the Kingdom aligns with the Vision 2030 goals of diversifying the economy through innovation and entrepreneurship, and of the National Health Sector Transformation Program to leverage cutting-edge technologies like artificial intelligence to build high-value health systems for all.
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