NEWSROOM

HostBuddy in the
NEWS

Awards, media features, and industry recognition for the AI ordering technology powering the future of restaurants.

Press Inquiries
1,000+
Developers we competed against
$81K
Square hackathon total prize pool
243K+
Scoble's tech audience reached
Featured in
🏆 Winner HostBuddy wins Best Generative AI at Square Developer Hackathon 2023 Competing against 1,000+ developers for a share of $81,000 in prizes Featured by Robert Scoble — Silicon Valley tech legend · 243K+ followers HostBuddy featured at NVIDIA GTC — World's Premier AI Conference Read the full announcement on Square → AI voice bot that acts as a call center for restaurants · Orders posted directly into Square Register 🏆 Winner HostBuddy wins Best Generative AI at Square Developer Hackathon 2023 Competing against 1,000+ developers for a share of $81,000 in prizes Featured by Robert Scoble — Silicon Valley tech legend · 243K+ followers HostBuddy featured at NVIDIA GTC — World's Premier AI Conference Read the full announcement on Square → AI voice bot that acts as a call center for restaurants · Orders posted directly into Square Register
Awards
🏆 Winner
Best Use of
Generative AI
Square Developer Hackathon 2023
July 20, 2023
developer.squareup.com
Square — developer.squareup.com

Square Developer Hackathon 2023 — Generative AI Category Winner

HostBuddy won the Best Use of Generative AI category at Square's annual developer hackathon — one of the largest in commerce tech, with over 1,000 developers competing for $81,000 in total prizes.

The winning submission demonstrated HostBuddy's AI voice bot acting as a fully automated call center for restaurants: answering calls, taking complete orders with all customizations, and posting them directly into Square Register with zero human involvement.

$5,000 prize Generative AI 1,000+ entrants Square Ecosystem
View on Square ↗
Media & Interviews
🎙️
May 2025
X (Twitter) · @Scobleizer

Featured by Robert Scoble — Silicon Valley tech legend

Robert Scoble — former Microsoft insider, pioneer of tech blogging, and one of Silicon Valley's most influential voices with 243K+ followers — featured HostBuddy on X. Scoble highlighted our AI restaurant automation to his global audience of investors, founders, and tech leaders as a standout product in the AI-for-business space.

243K+ audience Media feature
View post ↗
🎤
2024
NVIDIA — GTC Conference

Featured at NVIDIA GTC — World's Premier AI Conference

HostBuddy was featured at NVIDIA's GPU Technology Conference (GTC) — the world's leading AI and accelerated computing event, attended by researchers, engineers, and industry leaders globally. GTC is where the most forward-thinking AI companies demonstrate what's possible at the cutting edge of the technology.

Industry event NVIDIA GTC
About HostBuddy — For Journalists

Company Boilerplate

Copy and paste this description when writing about HostBuddy.

HostBuddy is an AI-powered ordering system for restaurants, winner of the Best Use of Generative AI award at the Square Developer Hackathon 2023. HostBuddy's voice and text AI answers phone calls, takes complete orders with all customizations, and posts them directly into Square and Clover POS systems — with zero human involvement. Founded in San Jose, California, HostBuddy serves burger restaurants, coffee shops, pizza places, bars, and more. Learn more at hostbuddy.io.

What the Industry Says

REAL Recognition From REAL Leaders

Square Developer Team developer.squareup.com · July 2023 HoneyBear Cafe · San Francisco

"This app uses AI and a HostBuddy voice bot that acts as a call center for restaurants, and it posts orders placed over the phone into the Square Register automatically."

FAQ

Common Questions About HostBuddy Press & Recognition

Did HostBuddy really win the Square Developer Hackathon?
Yes. HostBuddy won the Best Use of Generative AI category at the Square Developer Hackathon 2023 — competing against 1,000+ developers for a share of $81,000 in total prizes. The win is published on Square’s official developer blog at developer.squareup.com.
Robert Scoble is one of Silicon Valley’s most influential tech voices — a former Microsoft insider, pioneer of tech blogging since 2000, and author with 243K+ followers on X. When Scoble features a product, it reaches investors, founders, and enterprise technology decision makers globally.
NVIDIA GTC is the world’s premier AI and accelerated computing conference, attended by researchers, engineers, and industry leaders from across the globe. HostBuddy was featured at GTC for its practical application of AI in restaurant automation — voice ordering, phone agents, and POS integration.