Yerevan, September 28 – The Firebird Build hackathon, with a total prize fund of $105,000, concluded in Yerevan. The event, held from September 26-27 at the AI9 Startup Campus, brought together engineers and researchers who spent 24 intensive hours developing artificial intelligence tools to solve real-world problems, transforming their ideas into working prototypes.
A Collaborative Initiative to Boost AI in Armenia
The hackathon was initiated by Firebird in collaboration with OpenAI, NVIDIA, Picsart, the Union of Advanced Technology Enterprises (UATE), AI9, and YerevaNN. This partnership highlights a strategic effort to foster AI innovation in the region.
Alexander Esayan, co-founder of Firebird, emphasized the event’s alignment with Firebird’s vision: “This event is fully in line with Firebird’s vision to make AI computing power and technologies accessible in markets where there is great talent and knowledge, but developed infrastructure is not yet sufficient. Our goal is to create conditions for this potential to turn into new products and companies. Firebird Build is a step in that direction, enabling people here in Armenia to turn their ideas into action.”
24-Hour Challenge: From Idea to Prototype
Teams were tasked with building working prototypes of products within 24 hours, utilizing OpenAI Codex and receiving mentorship from specialists in the technological community. The teams proposed AI-powered solutions across various domains, including robotics and physical AI, healthcare, environmental protection, cybersecurity, and more.
Edita Ghazaryan, Executive Director of UATE, expressed enthusiasm for the community’s response: “It is very encouraging to see such a response from our community; we had more than 500 applications, which confirms that this opportunity was very valuable and in demand for our technological sector. Armenia is becoming a regional AI hub today, and we have shared this opportunity with our international partners, as a result of which we also have a team from Georgia. With the strategic partnership of Firebird and UATE, we will make such events continuous to provide new opportunities for our technological community in the field of artificial intelligence.”
Sargis Ginosyan, a hackathon participant, whose team presented a product for the advertising industry, noted the event’s impact: “We are participating in the hackathon with 3 friends, and it became an incentive for the team to do in 24 hours what would otherwise take several months. During the hackathon, we even made a sales plan. I am glad that there is a company of Firebird’s scale in Armenia, and such events are organized, because they open the way to find various solutions and implement ideas.”
Prize Fund and Winning Solutions
The total prize package for the hackathon amounted to $105,000, including $80,000 in cash prizes and $25,000 in OpenAI API credits provided by OpenAI. These credits will enable the winning teams to leverage OpenAI’s services to further develop their solutions.
- First Place: PhotonicsAI – This team created an AI control environment integrated with hardware. They were awarded a $50,000 cash prize and $12,000 in OpenAI API credits.
- Second Place: “Why isn’t there an Ollama for VLAs?” – This team developed an infrastructure for training AI models (VLA) for robots. They received a $20,000 cash prize and $8,000 in OpenAI API credits.
- Third Place: EXPM – This team built an autonomous security platform based on AI agents. It automatically detects vulnerabilities, proposes, and tests appropriate fixes. They were awarded a $10,000 cash prize and $5,000 in OpenAI API credits.
The Firebird Build initiative is part of the company’s broader vision to expand the capabilities of local specialists and startups alongside the development of AI infrastructure. Through such initiatives, Firebird contributes to the formation of an environment where teams working in Armenia can benefit from leading technologies and international experience, creating products for the global market.
Source: https://how2b.am/firebird-build-hakaton/
