SD Hacks is an intercollegiate hackathon where top student hackers from all over California come together to create innovative solutions in 36 hours. We're hosting a dedicated hardware lab, maker space and a virtual reality lab, in addition to the many cloud APIs, prizes, and swag offered by our incredible sponsors.

Hackathon Sponsors

Prizes

$34,950 in prizes

Grand Prize

The team with the best hack overall will win a PS4 Pro, DJI Spark, Oculus Rift + Touch and an Apple Watch 3.

Each member will also get a job interview from one of our sponsors, SPAWAR.

2nd Place

The team with the second best hack overall will win an Amazon Echo Show, a pair of Beats Solo Wireless 3, a QHD monitor, and a Muse Headband

3rd Place

The team with the third best hack overall will win a Samsung Gear VR, Holy Stone Drone,
BeatsX, and an HD monitor.

Best AR/VR Hack presented by CurioPets and High Moon (2)

First Place: Corsair K63 Mechanical Keyboards, Razer DeathAdder Gaming Mouses and a tour of High Moon Studios for each team member. Second Place: Gift cards for team members.

Best Beginner Hack

Raspberry Pi Kits for each team member in a team of all first-time hackers.

Best Hack using the DocuSign eSignature API (2)

First Place: $2000 Cash Prize, Second Place: $1000 Cash Prize

Marines Innovation Challenge (3)

Winning team(s) each receive up to $5K funding from MD5 plus mentorship/space from EvoNexus to advance their concept with USMC. For more information, visit https://community.md5.net/md5/home#activity-title

Best Game that Incorporates Movement for Good

Make a game that incorporates movement for a good cause. Each team member will win Tobii EyeX eye trackers, a ticket for themselves and a friend to the Fleet Science Center, and an invitation to demo their project at Genius in the House. http://www.rhfleet.org/events/genius-house

Best Smart Cities Hack presented by AT&T (2)

Entries must show the following: 1) Source code of calling the CityIQ Intelligent Cities API as part of the software application. 2) Presentation used for pitching solution during judging. 3) Active URL if a browser based app is deployed as part of the software application.
1st Place - Echo Show
2nd Place - Echo

Best Use of Twilio API

Merge VR/AR Goggles for each team member.

Best Use of Genome Link API

$3,000 cash for the team with the best use of the Genome Link API - https://genomelink.io/developers/

Blockchain Hackathonception by Nanome

Use the Ethereum Virtual Machine and other distributed technologies to develop a hackathon tournament system on the Ethereum blockchain! Winner will receive an Oculus Rift headset and 2328 MTX tokens (equivalent to about 2 Ether)!

Amazon Web Services - Best Use of AWS

$250 Amazon Web Services Credit per hacker and One Amazon Dot

Best Hack on a .tech Domain

$150 Amazon Gift Vouchers for the best hack/website submitted on a .TECH domain

Best Domain Name from Domain.com

Raspberry Pi & PiHut Essential Kit

Devpost Achievements

Submitting to this hackathon could earn you:

Judges

Ramesh Rao

Ramesh Rao
Director, Qualcomm Institute

Ryan Hill

Ryan Hill
Founder, SD Hacks

Roger Martin

Roger Martin
Chief IP Strategist, Qualcomm

Judging Criteria

  • Complexity
    How difficult was it to produce the hack?
  • Completion
    How fleshed out is the solution? Does it work well?
  • Innovation
    Does the hack bring a fresh new idea to the hacking community? Is the hack unique and groundbreaking?

Questions? Email the hackathon manager

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