Neo Announces the Winners of Polaris Launchpad Hackathon

More than 600 developers compete for $500k in prizes and business incubation and the potential to tap into $200m in Neo’s EcoBoost grant resources.

Neo recently kicked off their Polaris Hackathon with a goal to help developers succeed with Web3 and foster the ongoing expansion of a thriving ecosystem built on the Neo N3, the newest and most powerful version of the Neo blockchain development platform.

Along with the launch of N3 in 2021, Neo’s first hackathon was also introduced calling upon teams to spearhead projects and take advantage of Neo's powerful features. More than 700 participants and 95 teams responded, resulting in 11 winning projects–all of which received post-hackathon incubation support and are now building on Neo N3. The event incubated up-and-coming DeFi, crowdfunding, NFT-centric, and other innovative projects such as Humswap, ToTheMoon, Rentfuse, Lyrebird Finance, and many more.

This year, Neo returned with the Polaris Launchpad as the next opportunity for developers to join the growing Neo Ecosystem. The hackathon series was back with an expanded prize pool of US $500, 000 and opportunities for post-hackathon business incubation support through Neo’s $200m EcoBoost program. The judges evaluated more than 600 qualifying entries and awarded five Grand Prizes worth US$35,000 each in NEO tokens. The five Grand Prizes were given across five competition categories.

Grand Prize-winning projects that received a multiplier award in the Planathon phase will have their prizes multiplied by a factor ranging from 1.1 to 1.5x. Each winning project team also received a custom-tailored set of post-hackathon incubation opportunities through participation in the Neo Global Development (NGD) EcoBoost program.

Fifteen additional project entries have been selected as Polaris Launchpad award winners: 14 Excellence Awards and 1 Special Mention Award. Each winning project will receive US $8,000 in NEO tokens. Award-winning projects that receive a multiplier designation in the Planathon phase will also have their prizes multiplied by a factor ranging from 1.1 to 1.5x. Along with the prizes, the winning project teams will receive customized consultation time with the NGD EcoGrowth team regarding their projects.

Speaking on the occasion, John Wang, Head of Neo Eco-Growth said, “The high quality and innovative nature of these award-winning projects point to a bright future for Neo, the blockchain industry, and Web3, I commend the efforts of the many skilled participants in this event. I expect to see more achievements from them in the coming events in the Neo Launchpad hackathon series.”

Best Middleware Project Incorporating NeoFS/OracleProject was awarded to Greenfinch, a decentralized data storage solution on Neo N3 and NeoFS. Greenfinch will bring a range of capabilities such as granular permissions, privacy, and more to decentralized storage on Neo N3.

“We are ecstatic about winning the grand prize for the best middleware project incorporating NeoFS/Oracle. We set out to build a product that will ultimately benefit the community, but also show the world the incredible functionality of Neo and NeoFS,” said Alex Walker, a member of the Greenfinch team.

The best DAO project was awarded to Neodao, a smart contract and a client-side Javascript library that allows a developer with only typical website development skills to create robust DAOs on the Neo N3 blockchain.

Dogerift was awarded the best NFT / Metaverse Project. It is a GameFi built on Neo. Players use their NFTs as playable characters to earn tokens that can be used in-game to improve a player’s gameplay or be traded for profit. Players use their NEO wallets as game accounts to log in to the game and can use NFTs as playable characters and items.

The best DeFi Project went to Pumpkin Swap, a decentralized crypto trading protocol with swap, staking, and liquidity pool features. Sky, a member of the Pumpkin Swap team commented, “I chose the Neo N3 network as the easiest and most complete solution for my ideas. The Neo Polaris Launchpad hackathon has been a perfect opportunity to show my idea. My passions are coding and bringing my ideas to life. This has given me a chance to share my work and passion with the Neo community,”

Bamboo, a social platform on Neo N3 that natively allows users to explore the integration of Web2 and Web3, was awarded the Best General Category Project. Bamboo is a new Web3 social platform that generates exclusive NFTs by linking users’ existing centralized and decentralized social information. Users can use this exclusive NFT to participate in personal information upgrades, play social games, and add value to their own data and behaviors.

On June 8th, Polaris Launchpad will move into the final phase of the hackathon, Polaris Plus. As this final round kicks off, the Neo community will vote for their favorite projects using their Neo tokens. Neo will then match the community votes through quadratic means, amplifying the voice of the community.

Find the details about all Polaris Launchpad Hackathon winners here.