Unveiling the Triumphs: Exploring the Inspiring Stories Behind the Neo APAC Hackathon Winners

6 min readNov 13, 2023

On October 28th, during the Neo APAC Hackathon Finale in Hong Kong, Neo proudly revealed the five outstanding winners, each representing a distinct track. This marked the conclusion of the exhilarating four-month-long hackathon competition. The winning teams, chosen from a diverse array of categories, are now part of the groundbreaking $1 million “Web3.0 Global Acceleration Program,” jointly initiated by Neo and Web3Labs. Their journey into Web3 entrepreneurship and technological innovation has officially commenced.

The Neo APAC Hackathon, unveiled on Neo’s Twitter in early July, was conceived as a grand arena for Web3 entrepreneurs and developers from Asia and beyond. The participants competed for a substantial prize pool exceeding $120,000 and the coveted $1 million incubation opportunity. This initiative aligns seamlessly with the positive regulatory landscape surrounding the Web3 industry in the region and underscores Neo’s commitment to fostering prosperity in the Asian Web3 domain. The campaign spanned three months across five Asian cities: Tokyo, Ho Chi Minh City, Bangalore, Seoul, and Singapore, culminating in Hong Kong, complemented by online workshops and mentor sessions, aiming to attract and support Web3 talents in the APAC region.

Announcing the winners of the Hackathon, Neo Founder Erik Zhang said:

This event has reminded us of the blockchain industry’s incredible talent and dedication. As part of the judging panel for this year’s Hackathon, I can say all of the judges were highly impressed with all the applications and hard work shown by all participants. The Hackathon results are a testament not only to the strength of technological innovation in the blockchain sector but to the vast amount of creative solutions and revolutionary thinking in the space. The success of the Neo APAC Hackathon, held across five major cities in Asia, shows the verve APAC developers have for blockchain technology and the importance of supporting them through training, reliable tools, and funding to bring more Web3 solutions to life.

Five Victors Across Diverse Web3 Realms

In the afternoon of October 28th, all 23 shortlisted teams showcased excellence across diverse Web3 domains, including DeFi & Payment, NFT & Gaming, AI, Social & DAO, Infrastructure, and General/Special. Out of these remarkable teams, five emerged as standouts and seized the final prizes. The victorious teams are:

• Prophet — DeFi and Payment;

• magipop — AI, Social, and DAO;

• NeoCast — Infrastructure;

• RΞSPECT — General.

*The NFT and Gaming prize is on hold due to a potential violation of the terms and conditions for the hackathon competition.

To dive deeper into each project:

Prophet

Prophet is a groundbreaking decentralized platform enabling users to predict event outcomes. By depositing GAS tokens, users receive TRUE and FALSE tokens, allowing them to forecast future propositions. If their prediction is correct, users win. The platform charges a percentage fee for operational costs. Built on the Neo ecosystem, it operates on the N3 Testnet, utilizing the NeoLine wallet, with Gas as the test token. Transactions are transparent and viewable on Neotube.

magipop Forge

magipop is a DAO oriented toward supporting creators, built to enable content creators and give them a sense of belonging. magipop Forge is a community co-creation platform where fans collaboratively work on and showcase narrative projects. Through its engaging “Creathon’’ challenges, creators compete in fun tasks. Magipop Forge integrates AI technology, Magiry.AI, connecting creators’ ideas into a structured map. It operates on the high TPS Neo blockchain for transparency, keeping key data on-chain. Neo’s support and the introduction of its EVM-compatible side-chain fuel fresh possibilities for magipop, aligning with their mission in the Passion Economy.

“We, at magipop, extend our sincere appreciation to Neo APAC Hackathon for their steadfast support. As a creator community that is deeply committed to the Passion Economy, the introduction of Neo’s brand-new EVM-compatible side-chain has sparked a realm of fresh possibilities and ignited our creative imagination. This innovative platform propels us further in our mission to continuously deliver engaging, diverse, and socially beneficial co-creation within our creator community. We eagerly anticipate the future, as we continue to explore and expand within this dynamic space.” said Race Li, Co-founder of magipop.

NeoCast

NeoCast serves as an open communication middleware for Neo, facilitating cross-chain notifications and messaging for dapps, wallets, and services. Its protocol allows on-chain and off-chain communication for any smart contract, dApp, or backend service via user wallet addresses, offering an open, gasless, multichain, and platform-agnostic approach. Wallets can subscribe to topics, and messages can be broadcasted or sent to specific wallets within a topic from a smart contract, utilizing an abstracted oracle service or backend service through the API.

Fabian Ferno, Co-founder & CTO of NeoCast, expressed gratitude to Neo for organizing the global hackathon across 5 countries and the epic Hong Kong finale. “We thank Neo for organising this spectacular cross-global hackathon across 5 countries and the epic Hong Kong finale! Neo APAC Hackathon was a blast and we had so much fun building NeoCast — A Web3 messaging and automation service for the Neo blockchain. We’re really looking forward to building and scaling our product with the Neo ecosystem over the coming days!”

RΞSPECT

RΞSPECT stands out as a tailored crypto trading bot specializing in on-chain quantitative trading, prioritizing security, multi-chain support, and multi-language capabilities for an enriched trading experience.

Each category winner is honored with a final prize of USD $10,000 and is now welcomed into the Web3.0 Global Acceleration Program initiated by Neo and Web3Labs. These winners will benefit from a share of the USD $1 million supporting fund provided by the Neo Foundation. The accelerator program is dedicated to fostering Web3 growth, aligning with positive regulatory developments in Hong Kong and the broader APAC region.

Introducing Neo Star Award for College Participants

To recognize the significant participation of college developer teams, Neo decided to add one more award, the Neo Star award. This special award is dedicated to the best team comprising at least one college student. SuperSquad emerged victorious and secured the prestigious Neo Star prize. Danbee No, CPO and Co-Founder of SuperSquad expressed excitement about the vibrant Web3 atmosphere in Hong Kong and Neo’s leading role.

“So wonderful to see the vibrant atmosphere of Web3 in Hong Kong and how Neo leads the trend. SuperSquad team will move fast to bring a product Neo community wants to meet expectations!”

A Celebration of Talent, Innovation, and the Dawn of Neo’s EVM-Compatible Sidechain

At Neo, we’re thrilled by the successful culmination of the Neo APAC Hackathon, where numerous talented teams converged, leaving us inspired. This APAC-themed event underscores Neo’s dedication to future and profound development in the region, particularly centered around Hong Kong. With the recent revelation of Neo’s EVM-compatible sidechain, we anticipate a surge of web3 enthusiasts with diverse development preferences joining our ecosystem. The MEV-resistant nature of the Neo sidechain promises a safer and more efficient environment, steering us confidently toward the future of the Smart Economy.

About Neo

Founded in 2014, Neo is an open-source, community-driven blockchain platform designed to welcome developers into the Smart Economy. By enabling developers to digitize and automate the management of assets through smart contracts, Neo is built to realize the optimized digital world of the future. As the most developer-friendly blockchain, Neo meets developers where they are by integrating seamlessly with the world’s most widely used languages and tools and providing the most feature-complete blockchain platform for building full-stack decentralized applications. With native support for powerful infrastructure including decentralized storage, oracles, and domain name service, Neo is the ideal foundation for developers to build the next generation Internet.