Waddle Wins 1st Place at the OpenAI GPT-5 Hackathon 2025
Waddle won first place among 93 global teams at the OpenAI GPT-5 Hackathon by showcasing a GPT-5-powered digital clone and sales strategy simulation system for ecommerce.
Waddle has achieved another major milestone, following its receipt of the Most AGI Potential Award at the OpenAI × K-Startup Matching Day in 2024 and the signing of an OpenAI Enterprise Agreement in October of the same year.
The Waddle team, which develops the AI-powered ecommerce growth solution Gentoo, won first place among 93 global teams at the OpenAI GPT-5 Hackathon, held in San Francisco on August 9–10, 2025.
The event was jointly hosted by OpenAI and Cerebral Valley immediately following the release of GPT-5 model. Waddle, the only team from Korea, received the event’s highest honor. As the winning team, Waddle was awarded $50,000 in OpenAI credits and invitations to OpenAI DevDay, the company’s annual developer conference to be held in San Francisco next month.
Led by CEO Jihyuk Park, the four-member Waddle team—including engineers Jintae Song, Sangdo Han, and Taebaek Hwang—traveled from Seoul to San Francisco to develop a GPT-5-powered digital clone generation and sales strategy simulation system for online store visitors.
Using conversation data between the AI shopping agent Gentoo and users, the team built a system that generates digital clones of online shoppers and simulates the performance of sales strategies involving new product launches, promotional campaigns, and coupon offers. The project received the highest evaluation from a judging panel composed of representatives from OpenAI and leading global venture capital firms, including Sequoia Capital and Conviction.
Jihyuk Park, CEO of Waddle, said, “Building a polished product and bringing our idea to life in such a short period of time demonstrates both our team’s execution capability and the scalability of our technology. Through our collaboration with OpenAI, we will continue expanding Gentoo across global ecommerce platforms and transform the online shopping experience.”
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