A SOFTWARE company in Leamington celebrated its 20th birthday by solving tech issues for charities.
Black Pepper Software, based on Clarendon Street, organised a ‘Hackathon’ to help deserving organisations resolve a wide variety of technology challenges.
The Helping Hands Community Project, Myton Hospice, Canalside Community Food, Dementia Trainers and a health and fitness organisation all submitted issues for Black Pepper’s specialists to work on through their individual ‘hack’ projects.
Simon Jones, Black Pepper director of innovation, said: “We organise a hackathon every year for our staff, and we sponsor local university hackathons too, so we know amazing things can be built in a very short amount of time.
“For our 20th birthday we wanted to do something different and came up with the idea of asking local charities for suggestions of digital things we could develop to help them in their work. The engagement and interest we’ve had has been fantastic.
“I never imagined the sorts of things we’d end up creating, and the team here loved being challenged by the diverse range of real-world issues faced by our local organisations.”
Leamington-based Helping Hands, which helps local people in need through a variety of support services, came to the ‘Hackathon’ looking for help to design a new digital volunteer application form.
CEO Lianne Kirkman said: “The generous hospitality and IT expertise we received will be invaluable in streamlining our volunteer recruitment process. Similarly, the advice provided will also help us to respond to the physical needs of our local community more quickly when delivering furniture and essentials through our House2Home service.
“The positivity and goodwill of the Black Pepper staff team was exceptional and we couldn’t be more grateful. We’re really excited for the roll out.”
And The Myton Hospices received assistance in improving its online donation process.
The charity’s digital marketing executive Dan Brown said: “We were lucky enough to have Chris, Black Pepper’s head of user experience working on our challenge.
“When Chris presented his work back to us, he had exceeded the goals and expectations set out, which was absolutely incredible!
“We cannot thank Chris and the Black Pepper team enough for running such a wonderful initiative.”
Across two decades, Black Pepper has established a reputation for solving some of the most challenging business puzzles for a host of clients and is now looking to use its experience for charities that would otherwise be unlikely to fund the services.
Following on from the ‘Hackathon’, one of the charities will be chosen as a development partner, with Black Pepper committed to donating time to their project on a long-term basis.
Black Pepper Software celebrated its 20th birthday by solving tech issues for charities.
