Amer Iqbal guest judges at DBS Analytics Hackathon 2021

On 19th August, DBS Bank hosted pitch presentations from the finalists of the 2021 Analytics Challenge. The event was attended by senior DBS leadership including opening remarks from CEO Piyush Gupta.

The Analytics Challenge is an annual hackathon open to all employees of DBS as a means of encouraging staff to experiment with ways of applying data analytics and insights practices to a specific challenge.

In previous years, the challenge had been focused on using analytics to predict the winners of global events such as the football world cup. In 2021, the challenge was focused on ethical investing. Participants were given USD $1m in virtual currency and asked to use analytics to inform trading choices. The final portfolio was judged on both financial returns as well as an ESG score (Environmental, Social & Governance).

The 2021 hackathon attracted entries from 4500+ employees from across 15 markets. The top three participants were invited to present at the pitch event to a panel of expert judges who were able to ask questions about their analytics approach before passing down their final scores.