From Big Ideas to Bold Builds on Alkami’s Digital Banking Platform

At Alkami, we believe innovation doesn’t happen in silos, it thrives in community. From August 26-28, more than 200 developers, engineers, and innovators gathered at our Plano, Texas headquarters for the 2025 Alkami Hackathon, a high-energy celebration of creativity, collaboration, and problem-solving.

For the first time, we welcomed 41 external participants (including customers, fintech partners, and system integrators) to join forces with our employees in shaping the future of the digital banking platform experience. Over two days, cross-functional teams tackled real-world challenges using the Alkami SDK, building everything from AI-powered features to new approaches for developer onboarding and observability, all with one goal in mind: push the boundaries of what’s possible for financial institutions and their users.

Why This Hackathon Mattered

The theme,Building Beyond Limits, reflected our commitment to co-creating with innovators beyond our walls. As a TechFin, we focus on providing modern financial technology that delivers reliability, performance, and scalability, so financial institutions can confidently offer best-in-class digital experiences.

But we also know that building truly transformative digital banking solutions requires diverse perspectives. That’s why we opened our doors to external builders, enabling them to share ideas, challenge assumptions, and work side-by-side with our product and engineering teams.

With open banking application programming interfaces (APIs) at the core of so many conversations, this hackathon became a proving ground for how extensibility and collaboration can drive meaningful change.

The Builders Behind the Code

The energy at our headquarters was electric. We welcomed developers, architects, chief technology officers (CTOs), integration managers, and engineers from across the country, each bringing unique skillsets in backend, frontend, mobile, and full-stack development.

• 29 internal teams of Alkami employees
• 8 external teams made up of customers, fintech partners, and system integrators
• Each external team supported by two Alkami advisors (a subject matter expert and an extensibility expert)

From brainstorming sessions on whiteboards to late-night coding fueled by snacks and live music from one of our multitalented Alkamists, the atmosphere was equal parts exhilarating and intense.

Hackathon Day: A Headquarters Transformed

On hackathon morning, our cafeteria quickly came to life with conversations, laptops flipping open, and teams settling in. After grabbing coffee and breakfast, participants gathered to hear from Alkami’s CTO, Deep Varma, who reminded everyone that this wasn’t just about coding, it was about pushing boundaries and building together.

Soon after, the room shifted from applause to action. Teams broke out into designated workspaces scattered across the office, transforming conference rooms and common areas into buzzing innovation hubs. Whiteboards quickly filled with diagrams and sketches, sticky notes dotted walls, and groups huddled in deep discussions.

By midday, we paused for a working lunch, complete with a surprise treat: live entertainment from Alkami’s own Bob Brown, who serenaded the crowd with guitar and vocals. It was a reminder that innovation isn’t only about technology; it’s about people bringing their full selves including hidden talents into the mix.

As the afternoon unfolded, teams experienced the full emotional rollercoaster that defines a hackathon. There were highs of breakthrough moments, lows of debugging frustrations, and the steady determination of teams problem-solving together. External teams leaned on their Alkami advisors, who helped navigate tooling challenges, align on strategy, and coach them toward clear, compelling demos. By evening, the office glowed with the light of monitors and the spirit of collaboration, fueled by dinner and late-night snacks. No matter the challenge, participants leaned into the question:what’s possible?

Demo Day & Awards: Lightning Rounds and Big Wins

The next morning, participants regrouped. With 37 teams ready to demo and 8 coveted awards categories, the stakes were high. Excitement filled the room as teams prepared to showcase their creativity and hard work in just a few short minutes on stage.

Our esteemed judging panel consisted of Kristin Clark (Manager of Web Development, Veridian Credit Union), Matt Wilson (VP, CX Operations & Strategy, Alkami), Lesly Fruge (Sr Manager, Product Management, Alkami), Paul Bobba (Principal Software Engineer, Alkami), and Justin Knowles (Senior Director of Operations, Texas Tech Federal Credit Union). Each team was allotted just three minutes to showcase their functional project on the big screen in front of hundreds of attendees.

What followed was a whirlwind of innovation: lightning-fast demos that sparked awe, laughter, and applause. Some solutions earned “oohs and ahhs” for their sophistication, while others brought the room to its feet with unexpected creativity.

After every team presented, the audience participated in a live poll to cast their vote for the Fan Favorite Award. Meanwhile, the judges deliberated on the other categories, weighing creativity, functionality, and alignment to the Building Beyond Limits theme.

Finally, it was time to crown the winners:

• 🏆 Fusion Award
  • Winning Team : Risk Dashboard
  • Team Members : Bhaskar Surroy and Ian Robbins from Alkami, Brent Dowdy (
    HiFin Technology), Jeffrey Hartman (Educators Credit Union), Jon Amundson (Achieva Credit Union)
  • Project : This team created a centralized dashboard assigning real – time risk scores to members and customers, shifting fraud prevention from reactive to proactive while reducing manual investigations.

• 🚀 Trailblazer Award
  • Winning Team : SDUI
  • Team Members : Brennan Smith, James Nagle, Nathan O’Neal, and Elmo Wright, from Alkami
  • Project : This group produced a schema that enabled financial institutions to instantly design and launch custom mobile user interfaces (UIs) (without application (app) rebuilds or store delays), bringing self – service to the digital banking platform.

• 💡 Customer Delight Award
  • Winning Team : StandardSSO Admin Self – Service Overhaul
  • Team Members : Hayden Roses, Mason McCray, Spencer Bills, Joshua Clements, and Santosh Bhosale from Alkami
  • Project : This all – Alkamist team built a modernized admin hub allowing seamless configuration and troubleshooting of SSO integrations without developer intervention.

• 🎨 UX Delight Award
  • Winning Team : Goal Digger
  • Team Members : Amir Anjomshoaa and Greg Billings from Alkami, Shayne White (Nutmeg State Financial Credit Union), Don Zhang (Civic Federal Credit Union), Jonathan Parker (Glia), Dineji Olaniyan & Joe Slitzker (TTCU Federal Credit Union)
  • Project : This group engineered an AI – powered financial chatbot integrated into the mobile banking experience, providing personalized guidance for users to achieve their biggest life goals.

• ⚙️ Operational Excellence Award
  • Winning Team: Automate Show Firewall Traffic Logs
  • Team Members : John Crubaugh, George Whiting, Lucky Arora, Jonathan Govan, Jake Gibbs, Ken Ito, and Mark Wei, from Alkami
  • Project : This team generated a troubleshooting tool surfacing real – time firewall logs to eliminate unnecessary tickets and accelerate root – cause analysis.

• 🎉 Fan Favorite Award
  • Winning Team : Vault Reimagined: The Alkami Digital Twin
  • Team Members : James Lander, Anna Bradley, Nate Rabins, and George Faraj, from Alkami
  • Project : This group developed a browser – based 3D reimagining of Alkami’s iconic lobby vault, dynamically showcasing milestones and partnerships in real time.

• 🌐 TechFin Award
  • Winning Team : Onboarding Engagement Helper
  • Team Members : Jeremy Dyer and Arash Didehbani from Alkami, Youssef Fannichi (Hanscom Federal Credit Union), Alex Sorrells (Five Star Credit Union), Blake Johanson (iQ Credit Union), Andrew Jarrett & Austin Wellner (TTCU Federal Credit Union)
  • Project : This team created an interactive new – user tour paired with an achievement system, helping members and customers engage confidently with the digital banking platform from day one.

Why We Host Hackathons

At Alkami, we believe innovation doesn’t just happen behind closed doors. It happens when passionate people come together, share ideas, and explore what could be, especially when given the tools, space, and encouragement to create.

As one participant put it:

And the connections made at this event go far beyond the codebase. One attendee shared:

Shaping the Future Together

The 2025 Alkami Hackathon proved what’s possible when builders from across the industry come together to shape the future of banking.

From practical solutions to creative surprises, every project reflected the real-world needs of financial institutions and their users. By welcoming external participants to innovate alongside us, we deepened our partnerships, gained fresh perspectives, and reaffirmed our commitment to helping financial institutions accelerate growth through technology.

As we continue expanding our ecosystem with open banking APIs, SDKs, and extensibility tools, this event showed the power of collaboration to deliver next-generation experiences. To our customers, partners, and fellow technologists: thank you for your energy, ideas, and passion. Building Beyond Limits is not just a theme…it’s our way forward.

Want to learn more? Schedule a demo with an Alkami representative to explore Alkami’s digital banking platform and developer-friendly solutions.