NewsNov 4, 2026, 21:26 UTC

Solo founder wins $500K Gemini XPRIZE with AI 3D-model startup built in 90 days

What's the deal? Polyfork, an AI-powered 3D modelling business founded by Lucas Martinic, won the $500,000 grand prize in the Build with Gemini XPRIZE. The award recognised the company for building a revenue-generating business in 90 days.

What's the endgame? Polyfork sells 3D models as programs rather than fixed files. Users can resize, recolour, and remix models before downloading, making the assets more adaptable for design, prototyping, and production.

By the numbers: Within its first month, the platform built a catalogue of 583 models and generated $4,428 in revenue from 54 paying customers. Its AI-agent factory publishes more than 175 models per week, expanding the catalogue without a large production team.

Why now? The global competition challenged participants to build AI-native businesses that solve real-world problems within three months. More than 26,000 builders registered across five categories, judged equally on business viability, AI-native operations, and category impact.

Martinic, who represented Germany, pitched alongside four other finalists at Moonshots LIVE in Los Angeles. Judges included Cathie Wood of ARK Invest, Palmer Luckey of Anduril Industries, Mark Pincus of Zynga, and Logan Kilpatrick of Google DeepMind. XPRIZE chief executive officer Anousheh Ansari presented the awards.

Polyfork topped a field that awarded $2 million across 25 winning projects. Tician Cierre took second place and $200,000, while MyFixAm, LaunchBridge, and DodoPrep each won $100,000. XPRIZE ran the competition with Google as presenting technology partner and Devpost as administrator.

The signal: Polyfork's win shows how a single founder can use AI agents to automate much of a company's operations. That approach could reshape the economics of digital-content businesses by letting software handle recurring creative and operational work at far greater scale.