Solutions · Students
Hackathon project with a real brand on demo day
A university team turned a class project into a credible startup landing page overnight.
The situation
At a glance
The team had a working prototype but a generic README and no cohesive brand for judges and recruiters.
Their problems
What students run into
These are the gaps that slow launches — scattered tools, missing artifacts, and no live URL when it matters.
Working prototype, weak story
The team had a functional demo but judges and recruiters only saw a generic README — no clear problem, audience, or positioning.
No time for brand work
With 36 hours left, nobody wanted to spend half the hackathon picking fonts and writing hero copy from scratch.
Slides did not match the product
Pitch deck colors and tone were inconsistent with the app UI — it looked like two different projects.
Submission needed a public URL
Hackathon rules required a landing page link. They had localhost and a GitHub repo, not a credible startup presence.
How Foundry fixes it
From problem to live URL
Each step maps to a durable pipeline artifact — research, BrandDNA, preview edits, and verified publish — not another chat reply.
Brief in, brand out
They pasted the hackathon problem statement into Foundry. Business extraction and Exa-backed research ran while they kept building the prototype.
Three directions, one pick
BrandDNA generated three personalities and paused the pipeline — they chose the playful direction that matched their product vibe in under ten minutes.
Tokens for slides and UI
She refined colors and typography in the live preview editor. BrandDNA tokens exported straight into their pitch deck and app theme for a cohesive demo.
Live URL on submission form
Published before demo day and linked on the hackathon portal — a real subdomain, not a localhost tunnel.
What they did with Foundry
- Fed Foundry the problem statement from their project brief.
- Chose the most playful of three brand directions to match their product personality.
- Published before demo day and linked the URL in their submission.
Outcome
- Professional landing page alongside the prototype.
- Brand colors applied consistently in slides exported from BrandDNA tokens.
- Judges cited clarity of positioning in feedback.
We spent our time on the build. Foundry handled the part we usually skip.
Related solutions
See how others launch
Start with one idea. Run the same pipeline — research, brand, site, and publish — on your own subdomain.