Welcome to Cal Hacks 11.0! We're so excited to have you join us in downtown San Francisco for the world's largest collegiate hackathon.

Here are some resources to help you this weekend:

Live Site: live.hackberkeley.org

The Slack: hackberkeley.org/slack

We really hope you enjoy the weekend! Chat to any organiser (black shirts) if you need anything or use the #ask-directors channel on Slack.

And, don't forget, go bears!

Requirements

  • Submit your hack by 10/20 10:30 AM PDT and make sure to add your teammates! You'll have until 11:30 AM to continue hacking and editing your submission, but the project must be submitted by 10:30 AM.
  • Include an image of your project and GitHub repository for any code to be considered.
  • Include the table number you're presenting from.
  • All work must be done during the hackathon
  • You will have two minutes to pitch and two minutes for judges to ask questions of you.

Hackathon Sponsors

Prizes

$188,960 in prizes
Cal Hacks: 1st Overall
1 winner

Framework Laptops
MLH Winner Pins

Cal Hacks: 2nd Overall
1 winner

Bambu Labs 3D Printer
MLH Winner Pins

Cal Hacks: 3rd Overall
1 winner

iPads
MLH Winner Pins

Cal Hacks: Best Beginner Hack
1 winner

Drones

Cal Hacks / Berkeley RDI: Berkeley RDI Web3 Prize
1 winner

JBL Flip 6 Speakers

Cal Hacks: Most Entertaining Hack
1 winner

Nintendo Switches Lite

Cal Hacks: Hack on AI
1 winner

AirPods Pro

Cal Hacks: Hack for Impact
1 winner

Keychron Keyboards

Cal Hacks: Hackers' Choice
1 winner

IKEA DJUNGELSKOG Soft Toy

Cal Hacks: Best Hardware Hack
1 winner

Raspberry Pi 5s

Google: Most impactful app
1 winner

Prizes include Google-branded T shirts, hoodies, puffer vests, Timbuk2 backpacks, tumblers, mugs, weekender duffles and more!

Hackathon participants are invited to create apps with the Gemini API to showcase the power of generative AI.

Google: Most useful app
1 winner

Prizes include Google-branded T shirts, hoodies, puffer vests, Timbuk2 backpacks, tumblers, mugs, weekender duffles and more!

Hackathon participants are invited to create apps with the Gemini API to showcase the power of generative AI.

Google: Most creative app
1 winner

Prizes include Google-branded T shirts, hoodies, puffer vests, Timbuk2 backpacks, tumblers, mugs, weekender duffles and more!

Hackathon participants are invited to create apps with the Gemini API to showcase the power of generative AI.

Fetch.ai: Agentic Track Prize
8 winners

1st Place: 2000 USD, Internship Interview plus 50 Agents, 1M Messages and 200K Seconds of computation time on Agentverse for 1 month 2nd Place: 1000 USD Cash Prize plus Internship Interview 3rd Place: 500 USD Cash Prize 5 Honorable Mentions

Explore the potential of intelligent agent-based technology with Fetch.ai, which provides a simple framework for creating your own AI Agents that can communicate with one another. This challenge invites you to develop innovative solutions that address real-world issues across various industries. Whether you choose to focus on finance, education, healthcare, customer service, content creation or more, your goal is to leverage Fetch.ai AI Agents to build applications.

Hume: Best use of emotionally intelligent voice AI
1 winner

$1500 cash prize, $500 EVI API credits, Limited edition swag, potential summer internship opportunities

Agora: Best Innovation of TEN
1 winner

300K minutes free usage of Agora RTC

Both prizes get exclusive referrals to Supersonic(the RTE Startup Acceleration Program); If the team keeps working on the idea after the hackathon and once closed an institutional round, a place will be offered in the next upcoming batch of Supersonic, which includes another 1M minutes FREE usage of Agora RTC plus other perks and support provided by other leading players in RTE.

Agora: Best Practice of TEN
1 winner

300K minutes free usage of Agora RTC +3 months Free subscription of RTM Startup Package

Both prizes get exclusive referrals to Supersonic(the RTE Startup Acceleration Program); If the team keeps working on the idea after the hackathon and once closed an institutional round, a place will be offered in the next upcoming batch of Supersonic, which includes another 1M minutes FREE usage of Agora RTC plus other perks and support provided by other leading players in RTE.

Hyperbolic: AI Inference Application Bounty
3 winners

$3,000 across three different teams

Objective: Encourage engineers to build AI applications using Hyperbolic’s inference APIs (text, image, or audio generation). See the documentation. Requirements: Create a self-hosted AI application utilizing Hyperbolic’s inference API. Provide a demo, code, and documentation explaining the API integration, highlighting potential use cases such as: Healthcare Coding Math/reasoning (e.g., "Which is bigger, 9.11 or 9.8?") Identifying hallucinations in existing models AI societies (e.g., autonomous agents communicating) Customer service bots Content creation (e.g., marketing or creative use cases) Blockchain-related: AI Inference Application Bounty Use AI inference for on-chain transactions. Examples: Swapping or leveraging lending protocols using LLM (e.g., Uniswap API or Aave API integration).

Groq: The Best on Groq
1 winner

$500 to the Groq Swag store

To qualify, create a project powered by the Groq API (fully or in part). Projects will be evaluated based on their originality, utility, and creativity.

Snap: Dream it. Build it.
3 winners

Each member of winning team receives: 1st place: 4x Nintendo Switch 2nd place: 4x Soundview Speaker 3rd place: 4x Elexa Power Bank (20000mAH)

Create a Lens on Spectacles that pushes the boundaries of wearable AR. Whether it's leveraging AI, promoting health, building dream worlds, or solving everyday problems, showcase how Spectacles can enhance real-world experiences in innovative ways.

Singlestore: Best Real-Time App
1 winner

4x Airpods Pro 2

Judging criteria: Speed: Process and utilize data in real-time (~milliseconds latency), eg. video streaming, voice agents, trading simulations, IoT sensor data. Analytics: Show us what the data means, and actions that you can take based on these insights via real-time dashboards, RAG, agent-based workflows, etc. Architecture: Use SingleStore as the underlying database. Innovation: Show us something cool and be creative!

Skylo: Seamlessly Switch from Cellular to Satellite
3 winners

1st/2nd/3rd places will get a full Development Kit including Raspberry Pi (and all the accessories) and the Satellite Development Board, with $1,000 of connectivity credit to continue building your application in the real world. Winners will also receive a full resume review and 1 hour workshop discussion with our technical recruiter.

From drones to connected devices and asset tracking sensors scattered across the world, the future is being built by developers connecting real world devices in sometimes harsh and unpredictable settings to amazing cloud-based applications that can handle huge amounts of new data. Nearly 80% of the earth’s surface is not covered by cellular networks. Our challenge for you is to build a next generation connected experience that can utilize cellular and satellite communications to pull in data and take action from devices across the enterprise and around the world. Using APIs from our partner Monogoto and the hardware they’ll provide (device sensors, Raspberry Pi, satellite developer boards and everything in between) you’ll be able to communicate via satellite to build the next generation of asset trackers, automobile sensors, and hardware alerts.

Cartesia: Best AI Voice Project
1 winner

4x Playdate game systems

Has to be built using the Cartesia API. To win, build a fun, creative, or useful project.

Sui: Reimagine the internet with Sui
5 winners

We will be offering 5 prizes in total ($7,500). ONE 1st place for $2,500, TWO 2nd places for $1,500 each, and TWO 3rd places for $1,000 each

The best projects integrating with the Sui Blockchain will be awarded cash prizes.

Vapi: Show us your Voice AI
7 winners

We'll be offering 3 $1500 prizes for best uses of Voice AI.

The House Fund: "Cal" Track
3 winners

The top 3 winners get an automatic interview for The House Fund's AIA accelerator with Jeremy Fiance and David Bloom. The batch starts October 31st, and interviews are highly selective.

Most unique use of Perplexity

SCET/Pepsico: PEP+ Sustainability Prize
2 winners

1st place: Apple Max Airpods 2nd place: Hatch Alarm Clocks

Pepsico’s complex value chain begins from the sourcing of over 30 agricultural ingredients and distributed to more than 200 countries and 1000 manufacturing facilities. After consumption, packaging is either collected as waste or recycled. Your challenge is to enhance sustainability through Pepsi’s Global Value Chain. Consider areas such as optimization of manufacturing processes to reduce waste, innovations in packaging design to improve recyclability, and strategies to promote consumer recycling.

Chroma: Build your project with Chroma in an AI application
3 winners

$200 for each hacker in the winning group

We will evaluate how hackers used Chroma features like semantic search, metadata filtering, and experimenting with embedding models.

Warp: Best Developer Tool by Warp
1 winner

Keychron Mechanical Keyboards

Build a hack that focuses on improving the developer experience in some meaningful way - this could be tackling any part of the development lifecycle (creating, modifying or testing software)! Anything that can be used by developers for their work qualifies for this prize. Note the hack does NOT need to use Warp (though we'd love for you to try it out while hacking!).

Ripple: Best App by Ripple
2 winners

Build an innovative financial app using the **XRPL** or the **XRPL EVM Sidechain**.

Participants are invited to leverage the unique features of the XRP Ledger or its EVM-compatible sidechain (Available on Testnet) to create a cutting-edge financial solution. Whether you're building payment applications, decentralized finance (DeFi) services, or other financial tools, this challenge pushes you to explore the power of fast, low-cost transactions and smart contract functionality on the XRPL ecosystem.

Reflex: Best app built using reflex.dev
2 winners

[MLH] Best Domain Name from GoDaddy Registry
1 winner

[GoDaddy Swag Bag] GoDaddy Registry is giving you everything you need to be the best hacker no matter where you are. Register your domain name with GoDaddy Registry for a chance to win a Hack from Home Kit! Each Kit contains wireless earbuds, blue light glasses, selfie ring light and a pouch for easy transport.

[MLH] Best Use of Midnight
1 winner

[JBL Tune 510BT Wireless Headphones] Midnight is a data protection blockchain that offers programmable data protection capabilities powered by zero-knowledge technology to address the delicate balance between data protection, ownership, and utilization. This ensures that developers can leverage blockchain technology without exposing confidential information or losing control over their data.

To build on Midnight, all you need is familiarity with TypeScript or a similar JavaScript based library. The service is free to use and their developer documentation has all the information you need to get started. Build a DApp using Midnight this weekend for a chance to win wireless headphones for you and each of your team mates!

[MLH] Sauce Labs Hot Sauce Raffle
3 winners

[Sauce Labs Swag Bag] Sauce Labs empowers you to develop, test, and deliver top-tier web and mobile apps quickly and efficiently. Their unified platform makes automated testing and error monitoring easy to do, enabling you to save time building your hackathon project! Let Sauce Labs help resolve any issues with your code so you can get back to building an award winning hack. Make sure your project is hackathon-tested by signing up for a Sauce Labs account!

To spice things up even more, we're running the Sauce Labs Hot Sauce naming raffle and selecting up to 4 individual winners at this event. To qualify come up with a cool hot sauce name and submit it to the Sauce Labs raffle form for a chance to win some awesome swag including a backpack, beanie, and a bottle of Sauce Labs hot sauce!

[MLH] Best Use of Terraform
1 winner

[Hashicorp Keyboards] HashiCorp Terraform is a source available infrastructure as code (IaC) tool that makes building, deploying, and managing your projects even easier! Whether you’re working in the cloud or using local resources, Terraform can make managing and configuring your application simple and organized. From deploying Machine Learning models to spinning up virtual containers for your web applications, Terraform supports a wide array of cloud providers and services, taking the guesswork out of your next hackathon project. Dive into the documentation and discover all the ways Terraform can take the way you hack to the next level! Terraform’s community edition is free to use with no credit card required! Utilize Terraform in your hackathon project this weekend for a chance to win some awesome Hashicorp swag for you and each of your teammates!

Interaction Company: Build AI Agents that Proactively Handle Your Email!
2 winners

The entire winning team will be invited to join a hacker retreat hosted by The Interaction Company of California together with the HackMIT winners on the upcoming weekend!

Interaction will cover all costs associated with making this happen, including flight rescheduling fees and accommodation.

Additionally, all the winners will receive AirPods Pro 2 with USB-C and exclusive Interaction × The North Face jackets.

For the second place team, we will give out AirPods 4 with USB-C to everyone

Deepgram: Deepgram Voice Agent Quest
3 winners

Winning Team: Voice Agent Visionary
Prize: $1,000 USD and $2,500 Deepgram credits to continue building (~9K hours of transcription or voice synthesis)

Runner Up: Voice Agent Trailblazer
Prize: $500 USD and Deepgram Swag Bag (Owala FreeSip water bottle (24 oz.) and branded drawstring backpack)

Third: Bronze Voice Agent
Prize: $500 Deepgram credits (~1,800 hours of transcription or voice synthesis) to continue building

Devpost Achievements

Submitting to this hackathon could earn you:

Judges

Ddoski & his not-so judgy buddies.

Ddoski & his not-so judgy buddies.
Cal Hacks 11.0

Judging Criteria

  • Application
    Does the project have any feasible application in real life? Does it seem like something that someone could use or would actually have a benefit in the real world?
  • Functionality/Quality
    Is the project free of major bugs? Does it look appealing? The UI/UX doesn’t have to be absolutely perfect, but if we're having a hard time understanding the project by looking at it, there may be a problem.
  • Creativity
    Is this project unique and innovative? Is it a solution to a problem we have never seen before? A better way of doing something?
  • Technical Complexity
    The team should display a good level of knowledge in terms of the technology they’ve used in implementing their project.

Questions? Email the hackathon manager

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