The UK's First Beer, Cider & Perry Hackathon
Where the drinks industry meets technology. Five tracks. Endless possibilities.
Manchester, UK - Date TBC
Register Your InterestWhat is BeerHack?
BeerHack is a hackathon bringing together technologists, creatives, and drinks industry professionals to solve real challenges facing the UK's beer, cider, and perry sector.
Teams will form around five dedicated industry tracks, building working prototypes and pitching solutions to expert judges from both the technology and drinks industries.
BeerHack is led by a team with deep technical knowledge, experience founding and scaling technology businesses, and leadership roles within the UK drinks industry. The organising team has participated in dozens of hackathons - co-organising, judging, and competing - combining hands-on technical and business expertise with a genuine understanding of the sector's challenges.
Tracks
Each track focuses on a distinct part of the drinks industry supply chain. Teams choose a track and build solutions for the real challenges within it.
Resource Distributors
Malts, hops, yeast, fruit, equipment, and raw materials. Solve supply chain, sourcing, and quality challenges for the ingredients that make great drinks.
Brewers & Makers
Beer, cider, perry, and beyond. Build tools for production, recipe development, quality control, and the craft of making drinks.
B2B Distributors
Wholesale, logistics, and trade distribution. Tackle the challenges of getting products from makers to sellers efficiently and sustainably.
B2C Sellers
Bars, pubs, bottle shops, and taprooms. Innovate on the customer-facing side of the industry - from discovery to the point of sale.
Consumers & Organisations
Consumer groups, advocacy bodies, and industry organisations. Build solutions that empower drinkers and strengthen the communities around them.
Who Should Attend
BeerHack isn't just for developers. Great solutions come from diverse teams with different skills and perspectives.
Build the prototypes that bring ideas to life.
Shape the user experience and visual identity of solutions.
Validate ideas and build compelling business cases.
Brewers, cider makers, distributors, publicans, and retailers who know the industry inside out.
Document the event and tell the stories that emerge.
Bring regulatory insight and advocate for industry-positive change.
Equity & Inclusion
BeerHack is committed to building a genuinely diverse and representative event. We use a structured selection process to ensure fair participation across the industry.
Selection Criteria
- Sector balance - Balanced representation across all five industry tracks
- Professional mix - Range of experience levels, company sizes, and geographic locations
- Demographic diversity - Gender, ethnicity, age, and disability status (self-disclosed, optional)
- Reserved positions - Minimum 15-20% of capacity reserved for students, early-career professionals, and underrepresented groups
Team Formation
- Opt-in matching - Choose to be algorithmically matched into balanced teams based on track preference, skill set, and team role
- Manual formation - Form your own team or attend with an existing group
- Cross-discipline - Teams are encouraged to include technical, design, business, and domain expertise
Intellectual Property Protection
What you create at BeerHack stays yours. Our IP framework protects both what you bring and what you build.
Foreground IP Ownership
Teams retain complete ownership of all Foreground IP - the ideas, code, designs, prototypes, and materials created during the event. No exceptions.
Background IP Protection
Any intellectual property, knowledge, or materials that you bring to the event remain entirely your own. Nothing you arrive with becomes shared or transferred by participating.
Non-Exploitation
All sponsors, organisers, investors, and judges explicitly waive any claims to Foreground IP created at BeerHack.
Safe Harbour
Develop your ideas in confidence without fear of appropriation. A comprehensive IP agreement is signed by all stakeholders before the event begins.
Attribution Rights
Any post-event partnerships with sponsors, investors, or other stakeholders require separately negotiated terms with proper attribution and fair compensation.
Your Choice
Teams can choose to make their solutions open-source or keep them proprietary. The decision is always yours.
Frequently Asked Questions
A hackathon is a time-bound event where participants collaborate intensively to solve problems and build working prototypes. The word combines "hack" (creative problem solving) and "marathon." Teams typically form around a challenge, brainstorm ideas, and develop a tangible solution - such as a working app, tool, or product concept - within the event's timeframe. You don't need to be a programmer to participate; hackathons benefit from diverse skills including design, business strategy, and domain expertise.
Foreground IP refers to any intellectual property created during the hackathon itself. This includes code, software, designs, prototypes, business plans, presentations, and any other original work produced by teams at the event. Foreground IP is distinct from Background IP, which is any intellectual property, knowledge, or materials that participants bring with them to the event. At BeerHack, teams retain full ownership of their Foreground IP, and all Background IP remains the property of whoever brought it.
The date for BeerHack is still to be confirmed. Register your interest below and you'll be the first to know when we announce the date, venue, and full event details.
BeerHack will be held in Manchester, UK. The exact venue is to be confirmed. Manchester is home to one of the UK's most vibrant drinks scenes and a thriving technology community, making it the ideal location for this event.
No. The best hackathon teams combine technical skills with design, business, and domain expertise. Whether you're a brewer, a cider maker, a pub owner, a designer, a journalist, or a policy maker, your perspective and skills are valuable. BeerHack actively encourages participation from across the drinks industry and beyond.
You have two options. You can opt into our algorithmic matching system, which builds balanced teams based on your track preference, skill set, and team role preference. Alternatively, you can form your own team or attend with an existing group. Both approaches are fully supported.
All Foreground IP - everything you create at BeerHack - remains entirely yours. All participants, sponsors, organisers, investors, and judges sign a comprehensive IP agreement before the event. No stakeholder can claim, use, or commercialise your Foreground IP without your explicit written consent. Any intellectual property you bring to the event (your Background IP) also stays yours - participation does not transfer or share it in any way.
Yes. When registering your interest, you can select multiple roles. For example, you could register as a Resource Distributor and a potential Sponsor. We'll follow up with relevant information for each role you select.
Register Your Interest
BeerHack is coming. Leave your details and tell us how you'd like to be involved. Select all that apply - roles and tracks are not mutually exclusive.
Thanks for your interest in BeerHack.
We've received your details and will be in touch when we have more to share.