QUIE® — Where Earth Meets Craft

"Every piece carries a story. Scan the NFC tag on any QUIE® product and discover its origin, its maker, its land. Authentication born from Colombian earth, delivered through AWS and Vercel."

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Inspiration

In Colombia, artisans pour generations of knowledge into every piece they create — but that story disappears the moment a product leaves their hands. QUIE® was born from a simple question: what if every bag, wallet, or belt could tell its own story? QUIE means "Earth" in an indigenous Colombian language. Because every piece comes from the land, and should last forever.

What it does

QUIE® embeds a unique NFC tag (NTAG213) inside every product. When a customer scans it with their phone — no app needed — they instantly see:

  • ✅ Authenticity certificate — this piece is real, not a copy
  • 🏔️ Artisan story — who made it, where, with what materials
  • 📦 Batch data — production lot, date, quality controls
  • 🌿 Brand universe — the culture and craft behind QUIE®

How we built it

The platform runs on a modern serverless stack built for scale:

  • Next.js + Vercel — dynamic landing pages, one per NFC code
  • AWS Aurora PostgreSQL — products, lots, and NFC codes registry
  • AWS DynamoDB — real-time scan events (timestamp, city, device)
  • NEXO — internal admin panel with 5 specialized AI agents:
    • 🔨 CodeForge · 🏷️ TagWriter · 🎨 PageBuilder · 🗄️ DataVault · 📊 ScanSight

Each NFC code follows the convention QUIE-[6ALNUM]-[CHECKSUM], tied to a production lot QUIE-[CATEGORY]-[YEAR]-[SEQ].

Built for global scale

The architecture separates write-heavy scan events (DynamoDB, serverless model that absorbs any scan volume with single-digit millisecond reads at any scale) from relational product data (Aurora PostgreSQL with IAM authentication, no static credentials). Vercel's edge network serves landing pages from the region closest to the customer — a tag scanned in Bogotá or Tokyo loads with the same speed.

Challenges we ran into

  • Designing a system where one URL per physical tag serves dynamic content without slowing down the scan experience
  • Building real-time scan analytics without polling — DynamoDB's serverless model lets the dashboard query scan events instantly at any scale
  • Keeping the artisan aesthetic alive in a fully digital experience — every pixel reflects Colombian earth tones

Accomplishments that we're proud of

  • A customer can scan a tag and see the full product story in under 2 seconds
  • The admin panel lets a non-technical user generate, assign, and write hundreds of NFC tags in minutes
  • The brand identity — terracotta, forest green, gold — translates perfectly from leather goods to screen

What we learned

That authenticity is not just a security feature — it's a brand experience. The NFC tag is not a lock. It's an invitation.

Technically, we learned that AWS IAM database authentication eliminates an entire category of secrets management — no static passwords to rotate, no .env files to leak. Combined with DynamoDB's serverless model, the entire backend has no servers, no credentials, and no maintenance window.

What's next for QUIE® — Where Earth Meets Craft

  • QR fallback for devices without NFC
  • Aurora DSQL migration for true global multi-region writes
  • Artisan dashboard — let makers update their own story
  • Expansion to other Colombian craft categories: ceramics, textiles, jewelry

How to test it

Public landing (no login required): Visit https://quie.shop or open any of these NFC code URLs directly:

Any NFC-enabled phone scanning a QUIE® NTAG213 tag is redirected to the same landing page.

QUIE® Platform — Brand backoffice (login required):

NEXO Admin Dashboard (login required):

Both accounts are read-and-add demo accounts: judges can explore the dashboards, view scan analytics, browse the 5 AI agents in NEXO, and generate test NFC tags. Write access is intentionally limited to non-destructive operations.

Built for the H0 Hackathon

QUIE® was built specifically for the H0: Hack the Zero Stack hackathon. All work was completed during the submission period (May 27 — June 29, 2026):

  • Aurora PostgreSQL cluster provisioning + IAM-based authentication
  • DynamoDB table design for scan event analytics
  • Next.js landing pages deployed on Vercel
  • NEXO admin dashboard with 5 specialized AI agents
  • Physical NFC tag integration (NTAG213) tested end-to-end
  • Custom domain quie.shop pointed to the Vercel deployment

This submission is created for the purposes of the H0 Hackathon. #H0Hackathon

Built With

  • aws-aurora-postgresql
  • aws-dynamodb
  • aws-iam
  • aws-sdk-v3
  • next.js
  • node.js
  • ntag213-nfc
  • react
  • rest
  • tailwind-css
  • typescript
  • vercel
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