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SubGuard solves the escalating problem of "subscription leakage"-the significant monthly loss from forgotten trials and dormant services. Built for the Arc L1 Hackathon, SubGuard acts as an autonomous financial guardian for your high-fidelity payment operations. The Innovation: By combining Circle’s Programmable Wallets with Google’s Gemini AI, SubGuard implements a "Zero-Trust" approach to recurring payments. The platform generates merchant-specific virtual shield cards that the AI agent can dynamically freeze, or limit based on real-time usage data. How it works: When a renewal is detected, the AI agent analyzes service activity (logins, API usage, or streaming history). If usage falls below a critical threshold, the agent automatically revokes the payment authorization on the blockchain, ensuring your USDC remains securely under your control. The Impact: SubGuard transforms passive tracking into active, autonomous protection. It leverages the speed and low cost of Arc L1 to provide institutional-grade security for everyday subscription management, ensuring users only pay for the value they actually consume.

In this hybrid hackathon powered by Arc, developers will build the next generation of agentic commerce systems using Arc with USDC. Explore a world where AI agents and web services can pay for APIs, data, compute, and content in dynamic, usage-based ways, while Arc provides stablecoin-native settlement with predictable USDC fees and deterministic, sub-second finality. This hackathon is supported by Google & Google DeepMind, with a dedicated challenge and $40,000 in Google Cloud Platform (GCP) credits awarded for the best use of Gemini models and Google AI Studio. 📅 January 9 – 24, 2026 • Jan 9 – 23 (Online Phase) – Collaborate and build online with developers and AI innovators from around the world. All projects must be submitted by the end of the online phase on January 23rd. • Jan 23 (On‑site Build Day – San Francisco, CA) – Selected participants will be invited to an exclusive in‑person session to refine their projects and connect directly with mentors. • Jan 24 (On‑site Demos & Awards – San Francisco, CA) – Live pitching sessions to a panel of judges and ecosystem partners, followed by the official winner announcement. Get guidance from Arc and Circle experts through on-site support. 📍 On-site Venue (Jan 23–24): MindsDB SF AI Collective 3154 17th St, San Francisco, California, USA 🤝 Go solo or team up, it's your flow. 🏆Compete for $50,000 in USDC & GCP Credits. 📍 On-site participation is by invitation only. Travel and accommodation expenses will not be covered. 🧑🏻‍💻 Secure your spot now - sign up before the Kick-Off Stream!