The Marine Corps is bringing artificial intelligence developers together this fall to build tools that can be quickly refined or immediately moved into use, the service announced in an administrative message this week.
The event, scheduled for Oct. 26-30 at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California, will bring together military personnel, government employees, industry and academic partners and contractors supporting the government. Participants will choose one of two tracks: developing AI agents on the Defense Department’s GenAI.mil platform or advanced AI development using the service and school’s resources.
The hackathon’s intent, according to the message, is to “generate practical, digital solutions that solve registered requirements while accelerating the Marine Corps’ ability to integrate AI-enabled capabilities into operations.”
Participants will spend at least two full days hacking — at the unclassified level — before final presentations and judging on the fourth day.
Those interested must apply by Oct. 9. Chosen attendees will be notified by Oct. 16.
The military’s push toward AI and automation is being driven in part by the sheer volume of information expected on a future battlefield. During an exercise earlier this year, the Army found that a large-scale conflict could require troops to process as many as 1,500 targets a day, which is a workload far beyond what a headquarters staff could manage without automation.
Eve Sampson is a reporter and former Army officer. She has covered conflict across the world, writing for The New York Times, The Washington Post and The Associated Press.