Welcome to Action Space, Boston’s first anti-drone swarm defense hackathon (Oct 24–25, 2026). Hands-on, high-stakes, with hardware that actually flies.

The core challenge is counter-unmanned aircraft systems (C-UAS): protect a high-value mock commercial target by detecting, tracking, and defeating an incoming hostile drone swarm. You aren't locked into pure drone-on-drone dogfights, if you want to, build a defender swarm, deploy tag-along interceptors with nets, or mix physical catch with policy loops. Whatever holds the airspace.

Day one is strictly simulation in Isaac Lab using PPO and multi-agent reinforcement learning and building. Day two, teams get live windows to run their software on a fleet of Tello drones and against them. Seats are limited by hardware access, food is provided, and more than $1,000 in prizes are up for grabs.

Apply and register directly on the Action Space Luma Page or check the main Action Space Website for details.

• Creativity & Tactical Innovation (10 Points)
  Focus: Unconventional, clever, or novel approaches to holding the site.
• Sim-to-Real Adaptation (10 Points)
  Focus: How effectively your Day 1 Isaac Lab policies translated to the physical hardware on Day 2.
• Defensive Effectiveness (10 Points)
  Focus: How reliably your counter-UAS (C-UAS) stack holds the airspace and protects the site.