AI Tinkerers × Michelin Pune — Harness Engineering Hackathon

about this event

Pune's engineering community comes together for a one-day, hands-on, in-person event to build AI harnesses that work across hiring, research, marketing, operations, and beyond. In partnership with Michelin and hosted with Michelin Pune.

REGISTRATION & ELIGIBILITY — Space is limited to 70 builders. Applications are screened for active practitioners. Attendance is limited to applicants accepted through the official AI Tinkerers platform. A Meetup RSVP is only an expression of interest; it is not a registration, acceptance, or confirmed place. Participant screening, acceptance, registration, and communication remain on the AI Tinkerers platform.

EVENT FORMAT & TEAM SIZE — This is an in-person, one-day hackathon. Participate solo or in a team of up to 3 people. Teams should be formed while registering on the official hackathon portal.

YOUR MISSION — Build a harness for a real-world workflow. The harness should use multiple agents, each with a focused, scoped responsibility, to produce an outcome more reliable and useful than a single agent could achieve alone.

AGENDA — 9:30–10:00 AM: Registration and team formation; 10:00–11:00 AM: Welcome and kick-off (Harness Engineering, rules, judging criteria, safety briefing, and more); 11:00 AM–12:15 PM: Build Session #1; 12:15–1:00 PM: Lunch; 1:00–4:00 PM: Build Session #2; 4:00 PM: Submission deadline; 4:00–4:30 PM: Submission validation and shortlisting; 4:30–5:30 PM: Show & Tell — Jury Session; 5:30–6:00 PM: Jury deliberation and winner announcement.

WHAT MAKES A GOOD HARNESS — Clear agent roles with defined scope; constraints that prevent failure modes; feedback loops between agents; state or memory that persists across steps; graceful degradation on edge cases.

DEMO RULES — The demo is 3–5 minutes including Q&A. Run the harness live with no slides; explain each agent's role, constraints, and tools; show output on both the happy path and one edge/error case; explain why a harness was required instead of a single agent.

SUBMISSION REQUIREMENTS — Submit through the official portal: project name; one-sentence description; chosen domain; workflow explanation (agents, roles, and constraints); 2-minute demo video; team member details. Submissions close at 4:00 PM sharp.

JUDGING — Harness Design 30%; Reliability 25%; Domain Relevance 25%; Demonstration 20%.

RULES & REQUIREMENTS — In-person attendance is required. Solo participation or teams of up to 3. Bring a laptop and charger, your own API keys, and your preferred development environment. You own what you build. All frameworks, models, and tools are permitted. Follow organizer instructions and the event's welcoming, inclusive, builder-first Code of Conduct.

ORGANIZERS & PARTNERS — Organizer: Vikrant Khedkar, Software Engineer at ScrapeGraphAI. Co-organizer/partner: Michelin. Judges: Sheetal Bachkaniwala (GM – Innovation at Michelin) and Etienne Coursimault (Chief Digital Experience Officer at Michelin).

VENUE — Pune, Maharashtra. Exact venue details will be provided only to accepted attendees through the official AI Tinkerers platform. This Meetup listing is for discovery and promotion only. Do not rely on Meetup RSVP status for admission or participant communication.

IMPORTANT: A Meetup RSVP does not register you or confirm your participation. You must apply through the official AI Tinkerers portal to be considered for the hackathon: https://pune.aitinkerers.org/p/ai-tinkerers-x-michelin-pune-harness-engineering-hackathon

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