Riyadh’s Nextg3n Hackathon

Top Three hackathon winners, jury and mentors.

NextG3n Hackathon wasn’t just about competing; it was a place where passion thrived. Over a three-day period 9th-11th Januaury, 2025, we worked together to build solutions that incorporate blockchain, AI, and gamification. The hackathon’s focus was on addressing key areas that drive education and technological progress, making it an exciting and meaningful experience.

Hackathon Tracks to Dive Into

Track 1: Build tools for safe and secure hybrid spaces using Web3, digital identity, and smart passports.

Track 2: Create gamified experiences that develop essential skills like creativity and entrepreneurship.

Track 3: Design immersive games that turn learning into an engaging, interactive adventure.

Hackathon Criteria

• Combining Tracks: Solutions should combine two of the three tracks (Web3/Identity, Gaming, Future Skills).

• Target Group: The focus is on serving individuals aged 12-18.

• Market: All solutions should cater to the Saudi Arabian market, addressing its unique cultural and educational context.

My Team’s Key Topics

My team '“MintEd” (pun intended) focused on track 1 and track 2. The solution is an educational platform that caters for content creators (tutors and credible professionals) and students (between the ages of 12 to 18). All users would be able to earn a native token based on their productivity. For content creators, they would earn tokens each time they created a course. On the other hand, students would earn a native token upon course completion. The tokens can be used to unlock or “pay” for a course. In addition, student’s certificates would be minted in the platform’s blockchain.

1. Blockchain

   • We explored decentralized platforms to improve transparency, security, and efficiency across various industries. From creating verifiable credentials to enhancing digital identity systems.

2. Gamification for Engagement

   • We integrated game-like elements like tokens into the platform to motivate content creation, learning, productivity, and engagement.

3. AI-Operations

   • We harnessed artificial intelligence to onboard users efficiently to the platform as well as using AI in specific backend operations.

Eight teams (including my team) pitched their solutions ideas to a panel of judges. Each judge had a different background in web 3, such as a web3 company founder, venture builder and so on.

Hackathon Winners

Naturally, all teams focused on an educational solution. Therefore, some of the teams had similar ideas with minimal differences. However, based on the criteria and the judge’s evaluation only three teams have been selected as winners. Here are the top three teams:

1. Shu3la.

2. MintED <3.

3. Elevate3D.

I would like to thank the volunteers, organisers, participants, mentors and everyone involved in making this a reality. My personal highlight was meeting like-minded enthusiasts and discussing web3.

For more information please visit the hackathon’s website https://nextg3n.space