SHL fields a winning team in the Microsoft Power Platform Hackathon
In September, SHL Medical’s Process Development (PD) team won the championship title of the 2020 Microsoft Power Platform Hackathon at the DevDays Asia 2020 tech event, organized by Microsoft Taiwan. The team also snagged the Audience Popularity Award, coming out on top of 14 companies with more than 300 online votes.
The SHL PD team, namely the Power-Pack team, consisted of four colleagues – Carol Tsai, Blake Kuo, Avril Chen, and Reza Mortazavi. The four of them were given the task of optimizing the PD database to enhance data retrievability. The central aim was to develop a user-friendly portal for users to pinpoint precise data from SHL’s voluminous PD database. The result was an easy-to-use platform that combined all sources of relevant data from each database to one singular page that allowed ease of browsing and ease of tracking with a single request code. The SHL team delivered the winning presentation in ten minutes, presenting the problem and solution within six minutes, followed by a four-minute Q&A session from the judging panel.
Prior to the Hackathon, the team attended a Microsoft Power Platform workshop in mid-August where they learned how to leverage software functions like PowerApps, Power Automate, and Forms. As part of the workshop, the team participated in the Hackathon, in which they were challenged to provide a solution for a real business case with the newly learned software tools in three weeks’ time.
Empowered by their newfound knowledge, the SHL Power-Pack team knuckled down and refined the database’s interface, finessing it with personal greeting functions and SHL brand colors. With over two decades of experience in the autoinjector industry, SHL has amassed a wealth of data covering the various stages of a device’s development. In leveraging the integrated database, multiple teams can make cross-functional, data-driven decisions that ensure complete alignment across the design, development, and production processes. The consolidated PD data platform truly exemplifies SHL’s way forward in the digital transformation of its processes and operations.
The Hackathon took the form of a series of demos from competing teams on September 3. A total of 14 companies joined the race, including BenQ, Acer, MTK, and Chunghwa Telecom. Demos were judged on the feasibility of a commercial application, overall integrity, level of technical application, creativity, and presentation skills.
