"Ralphthon, which we held in Korea, is now being held in the United States. In the future, we want to hold Ralphthon again in Seoul together with American developers," said Jeong Gu-bong, a developer at Team Attention.
Ralphthon, an AI agent hackathon led by Korean developers and information technology companies, is heading to the United States. The list of sponsors has grown to include Naver D2SF, following Kakao Ventures. The event aims to bring top American developers into the fold to compete on AI agent capabilities.
According to industry sources on Wednesday, Ralphthon — organized by developer community Team Attention — will be held simultaneously in Seoul and San Francisco on the 29th of this month. Ralphthon is a hackathon built on the concept that "humans clock out and AI does the coding." Unlike conventional hackathons where participants write code themselves and are judged on the results, contestants in this competition spend only the first two hours or so presenting ideas and designs. The actual coding work is then carried out by AI agents. Winners are determined based on the final product completed through this process.
Ralphthon was able to expand beyond Korea to San Francisco — home to global Big Tech firms — because the inaugural event held in Seoul in February was a hit. AI agents fielded by all participating teams generated approximately 500,000 lines of code at the first event. The winning team had AI agents write 100,000 lines of code with no human intervention. As news of the event spread and drew intense industry attention, a second competition was organized in roughly a month.
The roster of Ralphthon sponsors has also become more impressive. In addition to Kakao Ventures and OpenAI, which backed the first event, Naver D2SF, Hangang Partners and Base Ventures have joined as sponsors. Judges for the U.S. competition include Shin Jeong-ho, a principal at Kakao Ventures, alongside local developers and founders. In Korea, the judging panel will include Lee Tae-yang, CEO of Base Ventures, and Lee Sang-hee, CEO of Sendbird Korea. Winners will receive OpenAI credits and a six-month ChatGPT Pro subscription.
Industry insiders say interest is high in the U.S., with dozens of local developers having applied to participate in Ralphthon. This is because Ralphthon, which is judged on AI agent performance, is not a common format for hackathons even in the United States. Analysts note that with AI agent development now considered essential, the event offers an opportunity to test "harness engineering" — a design-focused approach where AI agents work according to priorities and minimize hallucinations.
"Holding Ralphthon in the U.S. demonstrates how fast Korea's AI transformation is progressing," an industry official said. "Current and former officials from OpenAI and Naver plan to visit the Ralphthon venues in both the U.S. and Seoul."