SOTE AI Hackathon brings together wellbeing services counties and developers to tackle challenges in social and healthcare

Translated with the assistance of AI.

The Western Uusimaa Wellbeing Services County wants to help shape the future of social and healthcare and ensure that technology is used to develop smoother services for residents and better tools for professionals.

The SOTE AI Hackathon is an innovation event where startups, companies, research organisations, students and wellbeing services counties develop solutions to challenges identified in practice. A total of 35 teams have registered for the event, supported by a broad group of social and healthcare professionals acting as mentors. The aim is to find new ways to make services smoother and free up professionals’ time for meeting clients.

“We want to use AI where it makes residents’ everyday lives easier and gives professionals more time for meeting people. The hackathon challenges are also based on this principle,” says Nelli Myllylä, Director of Development and Innovation at the Western Uusimaa Wellbeing Services County.

“At the same time, the hackathon marks the start of a more systematic approach to innovation in our wellbeing services county. Our aim is to work with others to develop solutions rapidly from idea to implementation – both for our own use and for wider adoption,” Myllylä continues.

This is the first time the SOTE AI Hackathon is being organised in Western Uusimaa, but the aim is to develop it into a national operating model that can be continued and further developed through cooperation between wellbeing services counties in the coming years. The national development effort is supported by Sitra, the hackathon’s main partner.

“Many good solutions are created in Finland, but their wider adoption is often a challenge. Events like this allow wellbeing services counties to learn from each other, evaluate solutions together and identify opportunities for cooperation. This is an important step towards more impactful and scalable innovation,” says Petri Lehto, Leading Specialist at Sitra.

The hackathon seeks solutions to three challenges identified by the wellbeing services county:

1. More time for meeting clients
2. Up-to-date information for clients and their loved ones
3. An agentic wellbeing partner

More detailed descriptions of the challenges are available on the event website.

The event also includes a parallel programme focusing on proactive healthcare. The programme illustrates the benefits of proactive healthcare through practical use cases and lays the groundwork for technological solutions. Vertical is responsible for the parallel programme.

The teams participating in the hackathon will use synthetic, artificially generated client and patient data. It does not contain personal data or genuine patient records. The data is based on the population structure of the region, allowing solutions to be developed around realistic scenarios without compromising clients’ data protection.

The hackathon does not end when the event is over. The wellbeing services counties evaluating the solutions are committed to continuing co-development with selected teams. The aim is to identify solutions with the potential to move forward to further development and benefit residents across Finland.

Together with LUVN, the hackathon winners will have the opportunity to present their solutions at an event organised by Sitra and the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health during SLUSH week on 17 November 2026: From cooperation to impact: accelerating health sector innovation in Finland.