Solana hackathon aims to bolster crypto innovation in India

Blockchain platform Solana announced an open invitation to Building out Loud, a hackathon venture exclusively for Indian developers and entrepreneurs. According to the official statement, Solana plans to launch the 3-week long event in collaboration with Devfolio and YouTube influencer Superpumped. 

Solana’s announcement consists of a free and open invitation to “students, Web2 & Web3 developers, engineers and anyone looking to get into crypto organized in collaboration.” The move towards involving India’s open source community in crypto may be surprising to those aware of ongoing resistance against Bitcoin (BTC) from mainstream Indian banks such as ICICI. The last date for applying for the hackathon is 12 Aug.

Crowning hackathons as the birthplace of crypto startups, Solana stated:

“If you’re an ambitious engineer or developer in India looking to build something, this is the skyhook you’re looking for.”

In addition to the cash prizes from a pool of $80,000, winning participants will get to raise capital from Solana Foundation and prominent global investors. This initiative also sees the involvement of prominent crypto figures and entrepreneurs, including former Coinbase CTO Balaji Srinivasan, seed investor Chris McCann and CRED founder Kunal Shah. 

While the hackathon will use Solana’s global public chain to deploy crypto apps, Cointelegraph has reached out to Solana to understand India’s stance on such initiatives. The company is also yet to clarify if it intends to pay winners in cryptocurrencies or fiat.

Related: Phantom raises $9M to launch multi-chain crypto wallet

The Solana ecosystem has been responsible for the birth of several crypto apps and projects. Back in April 2021, Cointelegraph reported the commencement of Solana-native decentralized finance protocol Step Finance’s private token sale for $2 million. 

Step Finance was born out of a hackathon similar to Solana’s Building out Loud initiative for India.