As part of Colombia Tech Week and Colombia Tech Fest, the Col Makers technical community and premier regional universities have opened applications for the AI Hackathon Colombia Tech Week 2026. Designed as an intensive 24-hour sprint capped at 150 selected builders, the event serves as the primary applied AI marathon across the Andean innovation corridor.
The hackathon is supported by high-growth startups and developer platforms including Habi, v0 by Vercel, Supabase, Firecrawl, Publicis Sapient, Factored, GoodRec, Wallbit, Trez, n8n, and OpenRouter, bringing together a seasoned judging panel to evaluate projects built to scale into viable ventures.
About the event
- Format: In-person (Bogotá at Universidad Sergio Arboleda and satellite venues in Medellín) with hybrid support during initial vetting stages.
- Duration: 24 hours of non-stop coding and product delivery.
- Application deadline: November 15, 2026 (selective cohort of 150 developers and technical founders).
- Supported technical stack: Model access via OpenRouter, automation pipelines with n8n, structured web scraping via Firecrawl, relational and vector persistence with Supabase, and interface velocity via v0 by Vercel.
- Required deliverables: Public GitHub repository with build instructions, live product deployment, a 2-minute video demo, and a 2-minute recorded pitch.
Prizes
- Direct Cash Prizes (General Pool) — Over $4,000 in cash distributed across winning track submissions.
- Venture Capital Fast-Track — Direct pitch and feedback sessions with leading regional VC funds (NXTP and Rockstart).
- Cloud and Tooling Credits — Infrastructure and API credits sponsored by v0 (Vercel), Supabase, Firecrawl, and OpenRouter.
- Incubation & Makers Network — Guaranteed entry into regional founder networks and technical incubator cohorts in LATAM.
Technical innovation tracks
Participants tackle real problems facing Latin America through two structured tracks:
- Track 1 (Sponsored by Habi): Best Agentic App in WhatsApp:
WhatsApp remains the dominant communication interface across LATAM. This track challenges teams to build resilient agentic backends where the end-user interacts primarily through chat. Highlighted use cases include conversational home-buying advisors, legal title and deed verification bots, automated contract review assistants, and paperwork concierge agents. - Track 2 (Sponsored by v0 by Vercel): Best AI Product:
An open product engineering track emphasizing development velocity and actionable user value. Teams are encouraged to leverage prompt-driven UI generation to rapidly deliver full-stack applications (enterprise data unification for agents, interactive dashboards, and automated business workflows).
Evaluation and judges
The judging panel features founders, engineering executives, and venture investors:
- Adrian Mastronardi (CTO at Habi)
- Camila Rueda (Program Director & Partner at Rockstart)
- Diego Vargas (Venture Capital Investor at NXTP)
- Esteban Suárez (Developer Relations at v0, Vercel)
- Lewis Black & Midori Koide (Cofounders at GoodRec)
Projects are evaluated across four weighted pillars:
- Innovation & Impact (35%): Novel approach to an underserved real-world problem.
- Technical Execution (30%): Clean code, reproducible architecture, and production readiness.
- Commercial Viability (20%): Practical path toward user adoption and sustainable product-market fit.
- Pitch & UX (15%): Narrative clarity, presentation delivery, and ergonomic product design.
References
- AI Hackathon Colombia Official Portal — Official challenge rules, team registration, and event schedule. Date: 2026-10-15. Type: Official competition site.
- Colombia Tech Fest — Partner network and regional technology ecosystem. Date: 2026-10-15. Type: Ecosystem organizer.
