Hashed to Hold AI Service Hackathon ‘OBA.RUN 2nd’ With OpenAI, SK Telecom
Summary
- Hashed said it will hold the AI-based service development hackathon ‘OBA.RUN 2nd’.
- The company said major firms including OpenAI, SK Telecom, Shinhan Card and F&F will join the event as sponsors and supporters.
- Hashed said it has created a collaborative venue where companies open up their technology and data for developers to use through open APIs.
Forecast Trend Report by Period
Hashed, a global digital-asset and frontier-tech venture capital firm, said on November 2 that it will jointly hold the AI-based service development hackathon “OBA.RUN 2nd” with Market Fit Lab on November 7 at Hashed Lounge in Seoul’s Gangnam district.
The event will focus on building services that go beyond understanding user commands to actually carry out tasks and make payments. Up to 50 developers and product builders will take part and present products built using technologies and development tools provided by participating companies.
OpenAI will participate as a founding sponsor, while SK Telecom will serve as the main sponsor. Shinhan Card, F&F, vooy, maroo, Guuey and the Seoul AI Hub will also support the event. The program will begin with keynote speeches from OpenAI and SK Telecom, followed by introductions to development challenges proposed by each company and application programming interfaces, or APIs, available for use. OpenAI’s development tools will also be provided to participants.
Participants will be free to choose their own development themes. They may also take part in finance- and fashion-related challenges proposed by Shinhan Card and F&F. Teams will be limited to a maximum of three members. Confirmed participants will be able to exchange ideas and recruit teammates through Nitro Discord before the event.
OBA stands for Open Builders Alliance, a program through which companies open their technical resources and real business challenges to developers to build products together. In a survey conducted after the first event in May, 42 respondents gave it an average satisfaction score of 9.6 out of 10.
The event will include three product-development sessions and two participant-led networking programs called LETS. During LETS, participants will set discussion topics themselves and share AI use cases, service launch experience and ways to solve problems during development. After projects are submitted, the program will continue with participant voting, networking and an awards session called the OBA Awards.
The event will begin at 9:30 a.m. and there is no participation fee. Meals will also be provided. The first round of applications closed on November 1, and second-round applications will be accepted through November 4 on the official Luma page. Final participants will be notified separately.
Kim Seo-jun, chief executive officer of Hashed, said companies had so far kept their technology and data closed off, leaving developers to build on their own from the outside. He added that OBA is intended as a collaborative venue where companies open their technology and data and developers use them to build products. He said he hopes a culture of companies and developers building together will take root in South Korea’s AI and open-API ecosystem.
