A free six-week online programme with Encode Club for AI developers on Ethereum, Solana and over 200 other chains: three weeks of live workshops, then three weeks building on testnet.
Your AI agent already signs up for services, pays for APIs and deals with other agents on your behalf. What it cannot yet show the service on the other side is that a verified person is accountable for it. The Concordium Trusted Agents Hackathon, run with Encode Club, gives developers six weeks to add that proof to an agent they already have. Entry is free, everything happens online, and it starts today, Monday 2 November 2026.
It is also the first way into Concordium's 75 million CCD grants programme for teams building verified, accountable AI agents. Hackathon winners will be able to present the proposal to the grants committee directly, subject to its terms and conditions, which will be published when the programme launches. Grants go to projects with real usage rather than the best pitch, and a credible path to production here is what puts a team in view. To take part, create an Encode Club account and apply on the programme page.
Back with Encode, a Year On
Last October, Concordium was Gold Sponsor at Encode London 2025, where over 250 hackers took on our challenges and 19 teams submitted projects. The winner, Proctora, used Zero-Knowledge Proofs so students could verify their identity for an online exam without exposing their personal data, and the Encode London 2025 recap has the rest of the winners. This year the programme is online, so builders anywhere can join, and the brief moves on from verified people to the AI agents acting for them.
What You Will Build
Take an agent you already run, on Ethereum, Solana or one of over 200 supported chains, and make it accountable: it should prove that a verified human stands behind it, pay and get paid on its own, and keep a record of what it did. At the centre is the Verified by Concordium badge. The person behind the agent verifies once with an independent Identity Provider, and the agent then carries a badge that other agents and services can check. It shows that an accountable person stands behind the agent, never who that person is.
The agent's record lives in the Agent Registry, linked to the address it already uses elsewhere, with an Agent Card in the ERC-8004 format. x402 handles payments between agents, with fees sponsored so users never hold tokens, and a hosted MCP Server and A2A support mean you plug into the framework you already use. Everything runs on Concordium testnet and must make meaningful use of at least one Concordium component.
Today
Your AI agent
On Ethereum, Solana or one of over 200 supported chains
Signs up, pays and deals with other agents, but cannot show that a person is accountable for it
What you add in six weeks
- 1
Prove a verified human stands behind it
Verified by Concordium badge: shows that a person is accountable, never who
- 2
Keep a record of what it did
Agent Registry entry and an ERC-8004 Agent Card, linked to its existing address
- 3
Pay and get paid on its own
x402 payments between agents, with sponsored fees so users never hold tokens
Plugs into
Hosted MCP ServerA2AYour existing frameworkRuns on Concordium testnet, test CCD is free
The programme page suggests five starting points rather than fixed tracks:
- Add the badge, ERC-8004 and x402 to an agent you already run.
- Have agents check each other's badge over MCP or A2A before they deal with each other.
- Gate a service on a proven attribute, such as age, without storing anyone's personal data.
- Build agents that pay each other for data, APIs or work, with sponsored fees for end users.
- Build audit trails that support EU AI Act record keeping.
How the Six Weeks Run
Six weeks at a glance
Weeks 1 to 3
Learn
2 to 18 November, Mon and Wed, 15:00 UTC
- 2 NovVerify Once. Prove Everywhere. Reveal Nothing.
- 4 NovProve a verified human stands behind your agent
- 9 NovLet your agent pay and get paid
- 11 NovInside the rails, and inside the law
- 16 NovShip to production without crypto
- 18 NovPlug into the agent stack you already use
Weeks 4 to 6
Build
19 November to 9 December, on testnet
- 19 NovBuild window opens
- 22 NovCheckpoint 1: project, team and idea
- 24 NovOffice hours start, Tue and Fri, 15:00 UTC
- 8 DecFinal office hours
End of week 6
Submit and judge
Deadline 9 December, 23:59 UTC
- 9 DecSubmissions close
- 10 DecJudging by Encode and Concordium
- 11 DecJudging ends
Free, online, solo or in a team. Launch session today at 14:30 UTC.
Apply on Encode ClubHow Projects Are Judged
Test tokens are free, so transaction counts play no part. Encode and Concordium look at how deeply a project uses Concordium identity, the Agent Registry and agent payments, whether it has a believable route to mainnet and real users, whether the core flow works end to end, and whether it solves a real problem. Each submission needs a description, a public code repository, a demo video of up to three minutes, a CCDExplorer link and a short plan for going live. The platform locks at the deadline, so submit early.
Who Should Join
The programme is aimed at AI and agent developers, especially EVM and Solana builders, most of them new to Concordium. You do not need any blockchain experience, you can build solo or in a team, and test CCD is free from the testnet faucet. To get set up, start with the Developer hub, the AI agent technology overview and the dApp examples on GitHub.
Verified Humans. Verified Agents. One Protocol. In London, the projects let people prove facts about themselves without revealing who they are. This round is about the agents those people send out to act for them. Which agent will you bring?
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