We are pleased to announce that Plain Exchange, co-founded by Lillian Tam, our MSc(EComIComp) graduate and Moin Qidwai, our BEng(CompSc) final year student, in partnership with HKUST students, won the overall championship at the AngelHack Global Demo Day on 29 October 2015 in San Francisco. “The non-stop training and competing in San Francisco was a grueling, yet rewarding, experience that we couldn’t have done without the support of the Technology Transfer Office who sponsored our trip”, said Lillian. “The experience was priceless and could not have been possible without TTO at HKU”, agreed Moin. At the same event, Plain Exchange was also awarded Best Startup by 500 Startups, Best FinTech by Barclay’s FinTech Accelerator. 

Plain Exchange is a peer-to-peer currency exchange mobile app that aims to democratize foreign exchange by serving as a platform for buyers and sellers to trade different currencies at market rate or a negotiated rate, eliminating the usual high brokerage fees. 

Plain Exchange was developed during a 24-hour hackathon at HKU. After winning the local hackathon, the creators of the app were invited to participate in a 12-week accelerator program by AngelHack. Successful results from the program led to a further invitation for the Plain Exchange members to attend a pitch training boot camp at Silicon Valley Week of 25 October to 1 November 2015 in San Francisco, which geared up to the Global Demo Day competition.