Austrian bank Erste Bank sponsored a blockchain startup contest, awarding the teams behind two ethereum-focused projects.

The two winning projects were Etherisc, an automated insurance tool, and Status, a mobile-based browser that combines support for payments and decentralized applications. Each team received €5,000, paid in ether.

Three additional submissions, out of dozens submitted from 29 countries worldwide, received prizes in bitcoin worth €1,670. These were Bernstein (anonymous documentation tool), Minebox (decentralized cloud support) and Helperbit (decentralized insurance and donation platform). A total of 20 finalists were initially selected, the bank said in a 30th November announcement.

In statements, Erste Bank suggested that it was sponsoring the contest in support of its current investigation of blockchain, which the institution indicated could ultimately lead to new kinds of client-facing services.

Petia Niederländer, the bank’s head of retail and corporate operations, said of the contest:

“As one of the sponsors of the Blockchain Startup Contest, Erste Group is particularly pleased at the fact that all of the many interesting submissions for this competition have a similarly strong focus on the customer.”

Other firms involved in the organization of the contest include Austrian energy firm Energie Steiermark, eCounting, Kapa Ventures and BlockchainHub Granz.

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