1st Place at the European Commission Drupal AI Hackathon “Play to Impact 2026”

Setting the Stage: The Drupal AI Hackathon 2026

For context, my name is Shibin Das (D34dMan), and I’m part of the backend engineering team at Factorial GmbH. I had the opportunity to collaborate closely with my colleague David Galeano (gxleano), who is also part of the backend team, during this work. I’m also the founder of FlowDrop, a visual workflow-builder JavaScript library, along with a Drupal project that goes beyond workflow editing into orchestration, auditing, and logging.

The Europa Web Platform “Play to Impact” Drupal AI Hackathon 2026 brought together brilliant minds from across Europe to help shape the future of the European Commission’s digital ecosystem. Over the course of the two-day in-person event, developers, designers, and digital innovators worked side by side to create smarter, faster, and more open digital solutions built with Drupal and AI.

Although the hackathon itself spanned two days, it actually began a week earlier with a virtual kickoff. That detail may sound minor, but it made a huge difference. We met our teammates early, started exchanging ideas, and arrived on day one already aligned as humans not just as developers.

Day One: This Is Not Your Usual Hackathon

Very early on, we realized something was different. The first half of day one wasn’t about code at all. It was about:

• Meeting the team properly
• Understanding the business requirements
• Asking uncomfortable but necessary “why” questions

Only after that did we start brainstorming. We demoed possibilities, debated approaches, and crucially came up with a rough plan before lunch. That alone felt like breaking an unspoken hackathon rule.

Then came one of the most valuable moments of the entire event: 👉 We spoke with a real user.

That conversation completely reshaped our thinking.

More than half of our “cool” ideas didn’t survive that discussion. Not because they were technically impossible, but because they didn’t make sense from a business or user perspective. What became clear instead was the real challenge we were there to solve: exploring whether AI agents within Drupal could genuinely make life easier for content editors. The task was to develop a proof of concept showing how AI agents could support and streamline editorial workflows from content audits and scheduling to optimisation with the aim of transforming Drupal into an intelligent content hub that works with editors, not simply for them.

Later that same day, we demoed our progress to the client. The result? Another round of ruthless prioritization. Features were cut. New ones were added. Everything was re-aligned around practical impact, with a strong focus on automation and ECA (event-condition-action) integration, data ethics and governance, and human-in-the-loop collaboration.

By the end of day one, it was clear: this hackathon was designed to optimize for impact, not output.

Day Two: Parallel, Focused, Aligned

By day two, we were on our heels in the best possible way. Because we had already aligned on what we were building and why, we could split the team effectively:

• Half focused on development
• Half focused on demos and presentation

No chaos. No last-minute philosophical debates. Just execution.

This was also where AI-assisted development truly shined.

Generating code with AI significantly accelerated our work not just for implementation, but for:

• Rapid prototyping
• Demo preparation
• Presentation content
• Exploring and discarding ideas quickly

The gap between idea and working solution has never been smaller. And that shift fundamentally changes how hackathons and honestly, product development in general should be approached.

We’re no longer forced to spend most of our time translating ideas into code. Instead, we can spend that time listening, validating, and iterating on business needs.

Throwaway solutions are no longer a failure they’re a feature.

The Mental Shift (and the PTSD 😅)

I won’t sugarcoat it: adjusting to this new reality wasn’t easy.

There was genuine developer PTSD involved. The instinct to “just start coding” is deeply ingrained. Letting go of that and trusting a process that prioritizes understanding over implementation felt…wrong at first.

But by the end of the hackathon, the status quo had shifted.

We experienced a level of collaboration with business stakeholders that would have felt unimaginable just a few years ago. AI didn’t replace developers it freed us to operate at a higher level.

The Result

We participated as Team Token Burners, and I’m incredibly proud of what we achieved together:

Team members: Adam Nagy (team lead), David, Henk, Ziarla, Imanol, Francesco, Aarón, Enrique and myself, Shibin Das.

🏆 We won 1st prize.

Beyond the win, we contributed meaningfully back to the Drupal ecosystem:

Improved Modules

• FlowDrop
• FlowDrop AI Provider

New Modules Contributed

• FlowDrop AI Agent
• FlowDrop Node Session

This wasn’t just a hackathon project it was real, usable work.

A Well-Thought-Out Event

None of this would have been possible without exceptional organization and facilitation.

Huge thanks to:

• The Drupal Community of Practice organizing team at EC and EUIBAs
• Sabina La Felice, Monika Vladimirova, Antonio De Marco, and Rosa Ordinana-Calabuig
• NTT DATA’s Innovation team for hands-on facilitation throughout ideation, prototyping, and pitching
• The jury members for their thoughtful feedback
• Sponsors and ecosystem partners including Drupal AI Initiative, amazee.io — Drupal AI, Mistral AI, and DevPanel

This hackathon wasn’t just well organized it was intentionally designed for the future we’re stepping into.

Final Thoughts: What AI Means for the Future of Drupal Hackathons

This experience reinforced something I strongly believe: In an AI-assisted world, the true bottleneck is no longer code it’s clarity.

The ability to understand, validate, and iterate on business needs is becoming more valuable than raw implementation speed. And when hackathons are designed with that reality in mind, the results speak for themselves.

I’m excited to see where this approach takes the Drupal community next.

Curious why configurable workflows are shaping the future—and what led me to build FlowDrop? Read the full story here