​Accessibility Hackathon w/ EF x Raspberry Pi

​Join us for a one-day hackathon dedicated to solving real-world accessibility challenges using Raspberry Pis (w/ AI HATs) and provided smart glasses.

​Build useful voice-AI tools that meaningfully improve independence and quality of life for unsighted people.
Choose a track and produce a working prototype by the end of the day.

​About Chris Mairs

​This event is inspired and co-organised by Chris Mairs. Chris is blind, serves on the board of Raspberry Pi, is the former CTO of Metaswitch Networks (Sequoia-backed, acquired by Microsoft), and is one of Europe’s most active angel investors. He is also EF’s longest-standing Venture Partner and author of “The Open Eyed Man”, which examines how the tech industry continues to leave millions behind.

​Example Tracks / Use Cases

​You can build anything within the broader scope above, but here are some prompts:

• ​Identify banknotes for visually impaired users

• ​Detect whether a laptop is powered on or off

• ​Help elderly or visually impaired users manage multiple medications

• ​Control home lighting/heating through voice + vision

• ​Build an “accessible entry phone”: identify who’s at the door + keep them talking

• ​Read microwave instructions and autonomously control a smart microwave

​Who Should Attend

​AI or ML engineers, embedded-systems builders, computer-vision developers, and hardware tinkerers. No accessibility background required.

​What We Provide

• ​Raspberry Pis + AI HATS

• ​Credits 👀

• ​Workspace, mentorship, and technical support

• ​Food, coffee, and prizes

​Bring your laptop and any extra hardware you want to experiment with. We'll provide the rest.

​Schedule

• ​09:30 – Doors open, setup

• ​10:00 – Welcome + briefing from Chris Mairs

• ​10:30 – Team formation + hacking begins

• ​13:00 – Lunch

• ​18:00 – Demos

• ​19:00 - Pizza

​Apply to Join

​We have limited space and hardware.

​This is not a free-for-all event; we care about curated rooms. We'll build a room full of high-agency, young technical builders that you'll want to keep building with after the event.

​Looking forward to seeing what you build.

​Why this matters

​Accessibility features are often added late or treated as afterthoughts, leading to what Chris calls “inclusivity debt”.
This hackathon is an opportunity to reverse that pattern. As Chris puts it: “As web pages, browsers and Large Language Models co-evolve over the coming months and years, there is a genuine opportunity to improve accessibility with conversational voice agents allowing blind users to access online content just as well as sighted users.”

​Read one of his piece on the matter here.

​About EF

​Entrepreneurs First (EF) turns exceptional individuals into funded founders. We invest in people before they have a company, helping them find a cofounder, validate an idea, and build from scratch. EF's portfolio companies are now worth over $14B.