Mobile AI Hackathon: Cactus X Nothing X Hugging Face
The future of personal AI lives on the edge. Companies like Cactus (YC S25), Nothing, and Hugging Face are working to make this a reality.
We are inviting the best Flutter, React Native, and Kotlin developers to the Mobile Agent Hackathon. Join us for 24 hours to build the future of local, private and personal AI.
The Mission
Cloud AI is powerful, but the future belongs to the Edge. Your challenge is to build a mobile application that leverages on-device AI to solve real user problems. We aren't just looking for wrappers. We want apps that utilize local inference to achieve:
Total Privacy: Data that never leaves the device.
Zero Latency: Real-time interactions (voice, gaming, UI).
Offline Capability: Intelligence that works anywhere.
The Stack
You will be building with Cactus, a new open-source framework for high-performance edge inference.
Framework: Cactus SDK (Supports React Native, Flutter, Kotlin, C++)
Models: Push the limits of edge hardware with
Liquid Foundation Models (text, vision, tool calling)
Smol (text, vision)
Qwen3 (text, tool calling, embedding)
...and many other models!
Theme & Tracks
Main Track: Best Mobile Application with On-Device AI.
Track 1: The Memory Master. Best implementation of a shared memory/knowledge base for local LLMs.
Track 2: The Hybrid Hero. Best execution of a local <> cloud hybrid inference strategy (router pattern).
Team Sizes: 1-3 (every team member to apply separately)
Location: Join us at our venue in London or globally online
Date & Time: November 28-29, 5 pm to 5 pm GMT. Be prepared to hack all night!
Prizes:
Winner: Sponsored trip to San Francisco for a week + Lunch with a YC partner
Top 3: Guaranteed job interview at Cactus and Nothing
Top 5: Roundtable dinner with leaders from Cactus, HuggingFace and Nothing
Other prizes: Nothing Phone, Hugging Face Reachy Mini Robot.
Evaluation Criteria
Successful submissions must:
Use the Cactus SDK
Demonstrate functional AI features running locally.
Ship a usable .apk/.ipa or TestFlight link.
Details to be emailed after acceptance!
Boston hack supported by MIT GSW
MIT GSW is a multi-day, MIT graduate student-run conference that partners with a local organization each year to support the local startup ecosystem, this year, it is partnering with Kyungpook National University in South Korea!