Proposal: Celo × DropoutHacks 2026 Ecosystem Collaboration

Community
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Hi Celo Community :waving_hand:

I’m Koustav Singh, part of the organizing team behind DropoutHacks 2026, a 1,000+ builder hackathon taking place this March in India. The event is focused on AI, Web3, and production-grade applications, with an emphasis on real deployments rather than demo-only projects.

About DropoutHacks

DropoutHacks is a developer-first hackathon where teams:

  • Build and deploy live applications

  • Integrate real infrastructure

  • Focus on scalable, production-ready systems

Our audience includes:

  • Web3 developers

  • Early-stage founders

  • AI + on-chain builders

  • Student and early-career engineers

A significant number of teams are building DeFi protocols, on-chain tools, wallets, and real-world blockchain applications.

Why Celo?

Celo’s focus on:

  • Mobile-first blockchain adoption

  • Real-world payments and financial inclusion

  • Regenerative finance and sustainable Web3

strongly aligns with the type of builders we are attracting.

We believe there is an opportunity to drive meaningful ecosystem activation by encouraging teams to build directly on Celo.

Proposed Collaboration Structure

We would love to explore:

  • A dedicated Celo challenge track

  • Builder rewards or ecosystem grants

  • Deployment incentives for live Celo integrations

  • A technical onboarding workshop (Celo tooling, wallet setup, best practices)

  • Mentorship from ecosystem contributors

Target Outcomes

Our goal would be measurable impact, such as:

  • Real on-chain deployments on Celo

  • New wallet creation

  • Smart contract deployments

  • Continued post-hackathon ecosystem engagement

Rather than surface-level branding, we are focused on driving tangible ecosystem growth.

Next Steps

We would appreciate guidance on the appropriate DevRel or partnerships contact within the Celo ecosystem to explore this further.

Happy to share:

  • Our sponsorship overview

  • Expected builder distribution

  • Projected deployment metrics

  • A proposed activation structure

Website: https://www.dropouthacks.tech/
Email: koustavsinghcollege@gmail.com
LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/koustavx08

Looking forward to exploring how we can bring more builders into the Celo ecosystem :rocket:

Best,
Koustav Singh
DropoutHacks 2026

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Hi Koustav,

Thank you for reaching out and considering Celo as a partner for DropoutHacks 2026. That said, Celo’s current focus has shifted significantly toward AI agents, human-agent interaction, and miniapps built on MiniPay as well as FX and payments use cases. These priorities are pretty front and center on our socials and recent announcements, and unfortunately, this proposal doesn’t speak to any of them, so it’s not a strong fit for where we’re investing right now.

Also, our H1 budget has already been allocated and we won’t be able to sponsor external events at this time, so it’s not something we’re able to move forward with.

Wishing you a successful hackathon in March!

Best,
Lena, DevRel Eng at Celo

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Solid proposal structure. One thing worth flagging from experience running similar ecosystem activations: the post-hackathon engagement metric is usually where these partnerships live or die, and it’s the hardest to design for upfront.

Most teams build for the prize window, deploy once, and disappear. If the goal is genuine ecosystem growth for Celo, it’s worth pushing the activation structure to include at least one follow-up touchpoint – a builder check-in, a small continuation grant, or even just a structured offboarding that connects winning teams to Celo’s existing grant programs directly.

The technical onboarding workshop idea is strong. Pairing it with a post-event channel where builders can ask questions and stay connected to the ecosystem tends to keep momentum going longer than the hackathon itself.

Tagging @LuukDAO or reaching out via the Celo DevRel channels directly would be the right next step for the official partnership conversation.