Last week, Jalisco, Guadalajara played host to the 2016 Campus Party, which included four days of lectures, workshops and exhibitions, but also one of the largest hackathons in the world.

Campus Party is a festival of innovation, creativity, science and digital entertainment, this year gathering more than 20,000 young people from across the country to imagine what the world will be like in 20 years. During the event these “campuseros” work together with government, industry and universities to develop technological solutions to some of the problems facing today’s society.

Each year, the hackathon is the main event of the Campus Party as it encourages ways to combat poverty and unemployment. This year, 20,000 youngsters competed in the event at Expo Guadalajara to win one million pesos, breaking the previous Guinness World Record for simultaneous hackathon participants.

The winning team from the 12 finalists was Braniacs from Guanajuato, which developed Nodi, a text-based project to enable applications that help combat shortages in remote communities in areas with moderate poverty. The app can be applied to health, education, security, communication, financial inclusion, and other areas of concern. The team members are Saul de la Cruz, Erick Rico, Jeniffer Reyna, Jairo Javier Reinoso and Javier Dávila.

“I’m very pleased that we are changing the world through the hackathon with validated projects that are ready to use,” said Raúl Martín Porcel, director general of Campus Party, at the close of the event.

During the closing ceremony, the head of the Ministry of Innovation, Science and Technology of the state of Jalisco, Jaime Reyes Robles, spoke about the future of Campus Party: “In 2017 we will continue the record with 25,000 campuseros. We want more people coming from outside and we are hoping to create up to 600 companies.”

For his part, José Manuel Romero Coello, CEO of the Mexican Youth Institute (IMJUVE), said that the event “met objectives and expectations. All educational and government institutions are working against poverty. IMJUVE participation is agreed for 2017. Having such events is to give opportunities to the youth.”

Campus Party 2017 will be held from 5 to 9 July and is expected to be held in Jalisco until 2018, which is the date agreed so far with the government. Porcel also expects to double the amount of campsite allotments to 15,000 in order to attract more people from outside of Jalisco.