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AI Builder Hackathon Addis Ababa

AI Builder Hackathon Addis Ababa

August 29–30, 2026 · Bole Atlas, Addis Ababa

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AI Builder Hackathon — Addis Ababa

Registration Open

Hackation is coming to Ethiopia for the first time. The AI Builder Hackathon Addis Ababa is a focused 2-day event for local AI developers and builders, designed to identify and connect high-potential talent working at the frontier of agentic AI.

  • Date: August 29–30, 2026
  • Location: Bole Atlas, Addis Ababa
  • Theme: Agentic AI for Real-World Operations
  • Format: 2-day sprint
  • Language: English
  • Registration: Register now → (free)

Registration is open — reserve your spot. Sponsors welcome.

Theme: Build the Agent

Agentic AI for Real-World Operations. Build AI agents that solve real operational problems for real people. This year the three challenges are set in Ethiopia, drawn from live programmes and worked with synthetic data. Each has a named challenge owner on site. Pick one.

Challenge 1: From a voice note to a fundable proposal

Build an agent that turns a spoken story, phone photos and a paper licence into a complete, honest funding application.

Challenge Owner: Zenawi Haile

Money for small Ethiopian businesses exists, but the paperwork does not fit the people it is meant for: eighteen sub-questions, a 100-point scoring grid, and exclusion factors that end an application on the spot. Choose one path, an intake agent that produces a submission-ready application pack from speech and photos, or a reviewer agent that scores a batch into a ranked shortlist it can defend. Every unverified field is flagged, never guessed.

Read the challenge brief (PDF)

Challenge 2: Proof of impact people can see

The certificate proves, the story moves. One is anonymous and on chain, the other waits behind its QR code with the founder’s voice in it. Build the second and the link to it.

Challenge Owner: Jochen Moninger

Every supported workshop starts with a story that is collected once and never used again, while what travels is a spreadsheet row and a static PDF certificate. Build the storytelling artefact that lives off chain, reached by scanning the QR code on the certificate, carrying the founder’s voice with consent per person and per purpose. The anonymised certificate and the human story stay two cleanly separated layers.

Read the challenge brief (PDF)

Challenge 3: Ask the people the programme is for

Job-creation programmes count good jobs every six months, and the workers are never asked.

Challenge Owner: Adem Babo

Programmes count good jobs every six months from employer sheets, and the workers themselves are never asked. Build an agent that interviews beneficiaries in their own language on a cheap phone and turns those conversations into the programme’s monitoring numbers, with a verdict on each clause and a confidence score. It aggregates every record into the six-month sheet beside the employer’s figure.

Read the challenge brief (PDF)

Schedule

🗓 Day 1 (Saturday, 29 August) — Explore, Decide, Build

  • 09:00 - 09:30 · Arrival and welcome
  • 09:30 - 09:45 · Challenge and inspiration
  • 09:45 - 10:30 · Ideation and team building
  • 10:30 - 12:30 · Build sprint 1
  • 12:30 - 13:15 · Lunch
  • 13:15 - 15:30 · Build sprint 2
  • 15:30 - 16:00 · Mid checkpoint
  • 16:00 - 17:00 · Deep work session

🗓 Day 2 (Sunday, 30 August) — Refine, Pitch, Celebrate

  • 08:30 · Doors open
  • 08:30 - 12:00 · Final build sprint
  • 11:00 · Code freeze (optional)
  • 12:00 - 12:30 · Lunch
  • 12:30 - 14:30 · Final demos and pitches
  • 14:30 - 15:00 · Judging and community voting
  • 15:00 - 15:30 · Award ceremony
  • 15:30 - 16:30 · Networking and open exchange

Judging

A jury scores every team on five public criteria, 1 to 5 each: solves the challenge, it works, built for Ethiopia, trust, pitch and next steps. The jury decides places 1 to 3. The community vote decides the audience prize independently.

The strongest builders will be invited to a three-month working contract with the Hackation team and its partners, contributing to a live AI product being built for the Ethiopian market.

Partners

Organised by Hackation in partnership with sequa, ZeroHunger.AI and Opteria.

sequa ZeroHunger.AI Opteria

Become a Sponsor

We are actively seeking sponsors to support the Addis Ababa hackathon. Get in touch.

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Questions?

Contact us at: events@hackation.de

AI Builder Hackathon Addis Ababa
Register Now