Why Shipmates exists
Finding a team should not be the hardest part of a hackathon.
Hackathons move fast. Track details can land on the day, people arrive with different goals, and the window for finding the right teammates can be short. Shipmates is a small tool for making that first team-forming step feel calmer, clearer, and more useful.
The idea
More signal before the first conversation
I built Shipmates after spending a weekend around a large Berlin hackathon and seeing how daunting team formation can be when everyone is trying to understand tracks, ideas, skills, and availability at the same time.
The product is intentionally simple: participants answer guided Discord questions, organizers publish matching rounds at the right moments, and matches explain why a group might work. It is not meant to replace human judgment. It is meant to give people a better starting point.
Who built it
Built by Alex Adamov
I am Alex Adamov, building as ysqander on GitHub and @Ysqander on X. You can also find me on LinkedIn. I work on AI-native tools and practical workflows, with public projects around coding agents, research assistants, interview coaching, and interactive technical demos.
I also lead Verthandi AI, where I build source-backed, reviewable AI workflows for M&A, advisory, and investment teams. Before that, I spent twelve years inside private equity, strategy consulting, and corporate transformation.