Alchemy Contest Rules

 

Common terms used in these rules:

These are the general official rules that govern how contest promotions organized by Tencent Quantum Lab operate. Such a promotion will be simply referred to as the "contest" or the "challenge" throughout the rest of these rules.

In these rules, "organizers", "TQL", "we", "our", and "us" refer to Tencent Quantum Lab and possible other sponsors; "contest website" refers to http://alchemy.tencent.com; "participant", "you", and "yourself" refer to an eligible contest participant or team. "Development phase" refers to phase 1 of the contest, while "final evaluation stage" refers to phase 2 of the contest.

 

SECTION 1 Contest Description

The goal of the contest is to encourage the machine learning community to help develop better models or approaches to predict molecular properties. All eligible entries received will be judged using the metrics described on the contest webstie to determine winners as displayed on leaderboards.

 

SECTION 2 Contest Schedule

The schedule provided on the contest website at the beginning of the challenge may be modified by the organizers at any time. The registered participants will be notified by email of any change in the schedule. To that end, they should provide a valid email.

 

SECTION 3 Eligibility

You are eligible to enter this contest if you meet the following requirements:

• (a) You are an individual or a team of people desiring to contribute to the tasks of the challenge and accepting to follow its rules; and
• (b) You are not an employee of Tencent Quantum Lab or closely associated with other challenge sponsors; and
• (c) You are not involved in any part of the administration and execution of this contest; and
• (d) You are not an immediate family (parent, sibling, spouse, or child) or household member of an employee of Tencent Quantum Lab or another challenge sponsor, or a person involved in any part of the administration and execution of this contest.

If you choose to submit an entry, but are not qualified to enter the contest, this entry is voluntary, and any entry you submit is governed by the remainder of these contest rules; Tencent Quantum Lab reserves the right to evaluate it for scientific purposes. If you are not qualified to submit a contest entry and still choose to submit one, under no circumstances will such entries qualify for sponsored prizes.

 

SECTION 4 Entry

To be eligible for judging, an entry must meet the following content / technical requirements:

• (a) Entry contents: The participants are required to submit entries following the instructions provided on the challenge website. To be consider eligible for the sponsored awards in Phase 2 of the competition, participants will be asked to provide a signed "DECLARATION OF ELIGIBILITY, NONEXCLUSIVE LICENSE, AND RELEASE " form and the source codes used in the competition if the participant's ranking is among the top three on the leaderboard at the end of the contest.
• (b) Pre-requisite: Unless specified on the website of the challenge, there is no pre-requisite to participate, including no requirement to have participated in previous challenges.
• (c) Use of data provided: All data provided by Tencent Quantum Lab are freely available to the participants from the website of the challenge under license terms provided with the data.
  1. Test data:

     The organizers will use test data to perform the final evaluation, hence the participants' final entry will be based on test data. The test data can be downloaded from the contest website starting 8/1/2019 when Phase 2 begins.

  2. Training and validation data:

     The contest organizers will make available to the participants a training dataset with truth values, and a validation set with no truth values. The validation data will be used by the participants for practice purposes to validate their systems. It will be similar in composition to the test set.

(d) Submission: The entries of the participants will be submitted online via the contest website. During the development period, the participants can submit five times per day and will receive immediate feedback on validation data released for practice purpose. For the final evaluation, participants are only allowed to submit predictionos once per day and twenty submissions in total. The performances on test data will be considered for the sponsored award.

(e) Original work, permissions: In addition, by submitting your entry into this contest you confirm that, to the best of your knowledge:

1. Your entry is your own original work; and
2. Your entry only includes material that you own, or that you have permission from the copyright / trademark owner to use.

 

SECTION 5 Potential use of entry (including codes if requested)

By submitting your code, you:

• (a) Are granting us an irrevocable, worldwide right and license, in exchange for your opportunity to participate in the contest and potential prize awards, for the duration of the protection of the copyrights to:
  1. Use, review, assess, test and otherwise analyze results submitted or produced by your code and other material submitted by you in connection with this contest and any future research or contests sponsored by TQL and other challenge sponsors; and
  2. Feature your entry and all its content in connection with the promotion of this contest in all media (now known or later developed); This license does not extend to methods, algorithms, source code used to generate your entry.
• (b) Agree to sign any necessary documentation that may be required for us and our designees to make use of the rights you granted above;
• (c) Understand and acknowledge that sponsors and other entrants may have developed or commissioned materials similar or identical to your submission and you waive any claims you may have resulting from any similarities to your entry;
• (d) Understand that we cannot control the incoming information you will disclose to our representatives or our co-sponsor's representatives in the course of entering, or what our representatives will remember about your entry. You also understand that we will not restrict work assignments of representatives or our co-sponsor's representatives who have had access to your entry. By entering this contest, you agree that use of information in our representatives' or our co-sponsor's representatives unaided memories in the development or deployment of our products or services does not create liability for us under this agreement or copyright or trade secret law;
• (e) Understand that you will not receive any compensation or credit for use of your entry, other than what is described in these official rules.

If you do not want to grant us these rights to your entry, please do not enter this contest.

 

SECTION 6 Submission of entries

• (a) Follow the instructions on the contest website to submit entries. Tencent Quantum Lab may use a third party platform to submit and score entries ("submission plarform").
• (b) Unless otherwise specified on the contest website, the participants will be registered as mutually exclusive teams. Each team may submit only five entries per day during the development phase and one entry per day during the final evaluation stage. There is an additional constraint that only twenty submissions in total are allowed during the final evaluation stage. We are not responsible for entries that we do not receive for any reason, or for entries that we receive but are not properly formatted according to the description provided on the contest website.
• (c) The participants are also subject to accepting the terms and conditions of the submission platform chosen to submit and score entries.
• (d) The participants must follow the instructions. We will automatically disqualify incomplete or invalid entries.

 

SECTION 7 Judging the entries

The top three results on the leaderboard on 9/30/2019 will be awarded the prizes according to the most up-to-date description on the contest website. The organizers will verify that the winners complied with the rules, including that they documented their method. If any entry gets revoked by the judges, next contenstant on the leaderboard will be contacted to provide their source code and documentation for evaluation.

The decisions of the organizers are final and binding. The distribution of prizes according to the will be made within three (3) months after completion of the final evaluation. If we do not receive a sufficient number of entries meeting the entry requirements, we may, at our discretion based on the above criteria, not award any or all of the contest prizes below. In the event of a tie between any eligible entries, the tie will be broken by giving preference to the earliest submission, using the time stamp of the submission platform.

If you do not agree with the judging criteria, please do not enter this contest.

 

SECTION 8 Prizes and Awards

Tencent Quantum Lab is the financial sponsor of this contest.

• (a) Prizes Prizes as described on the website of the challenge will be awarded as incentive prizes to boost contest participation. To be eligible for prizes and promote the development of academic research in related fields, the top three ranking participants might be required to publicly release their code under an Apache 2.0 license. Alternatively, they may elect another license taken among popular OSI-approved licenses, after consulting with the organizers. Preferred alternative licenses include BSD 3-Clause "New" or "Revised" license, BSD 2-Clause "Simplified" or "FreeBSD" license. Additionally, they must make their code accessible on-line for a period of not less than three years following the end of the challenge.
• (b) If for any reason the advertised prizes are unavailable, unless to do so would be prohibited by law, we reserve the right to substitute a prize(s) of equal or greater value, as permitted. We will only award one prize per team. If you are selected as a potential winner of this contest:
  You may not designate someone else as the winner. If you are unable or unwilling to accept your prize, we will award it to an alternate potential winner.
  1. If you accept a prize, you will be solely responsible for all applicable taxes related to accepting the prize.
  2. If you are a minor in your place of residence, we may award the prize to your parent/legal guardian on your behalf and your parent/legal guardian will be designated as the winner.

If you do not agree with these terms, please do not enter this contest.

 

SECTION 9 Notifications

If there is any change to data, schedule, instructions of participation, or these rules, the registered participants will be notified at the email they provided with the registration.

If you are a potential winner, we will notify you by sending a message to the e-mail address listed on your final entry within seven days following the determination of winners. If the notification that we send is returned as undeliverable, or you are otherwise unreachable for any reason, we may award the prize to an alternate winner, unless forbidden by applicable law.

Winners who have entered the contest as a team will be responsible to share any prize among their members. The prize will be delivered to the registered team leader. If this person becomes unavailable for any reason, the prize will be delivered to be the authorized account holder of the e-mail address used to make the winning entry.

If you are a potential winner, we may require you to sign a "DECLARATION OF ELIGIBILITY, NONEXCLUSIVE LICENSE, AND RELEASE " form and applicable tax forms. If you are a potential winner and are a minor in your place of residence, and we require that your parent or legal guardian will be designated as the winner, and we may require that they sign a "DECLARATION OF ELIGIBILITY, NONEXCLUSIVE LICENSE, AND RELEASE " form on your behalf. If you, (or your parent/legal guardian if applicable), do not sign and return these required forms within the time period listed on the winner notification message, we may disqualify you (or the designated parent/legal guardian) and select an alternate selected winner.

 

SECTION 10 On-line notification

We will post changes in the rules or changes in the data as well as the names of confirmed winners (after contest is over) online on the website of the challenge. This list will remain posted for one year or will be made available upon request by sending email to qlab@tencent.com.

 

SECTION 11 Conditions.

By entering this contest you agree:

• (a) To abide by these official rules;
• (b) To the extent allowable under applicable law, to release and hold harmless Tencent Quantum Lab, and other sponsors, their respective parents, subsidiaries, affiliates, employees and agents from any and all liability or any injury, loss, damage, right, claim or action of any kind arising from or in connection with this contest or any prize won save for residents of the United Kingdom, Chile, Korea, Greece, Brazil, Turkey, Hong Kong, France and Germany with respect to claims resulting from death or personal injury arising from TQL's and other sponsors' negligence, for residents of the United Kingdom with respect to claims resulting from the tort of deceit or any other liabilities that may not be excluded by law, and for residents of Australia in respect of any implied condition or warranty the exclusion of which from these official rules would contravene any statute or cause any part of these official rules to be void;
• (c) That TQL's decisions will be final and binding on all matters related to this contest; and
• (d) That by accepting a prize, TQL and other sponsors may use your team name, your name, and your place of residence online and in print, or in any other media, in connection with this contest, without payment or compensation to you. The "DECLARATION OF ELIGIBILITY, NONEXCLUSIVE LICENSE, AND RELEASE " form provided to the potential winner will make reference to obtaining his/her free consent to use his/her name and place of residence. In any case, the lack of such consent does not prevent the winner from receiving the prize.
• (e) This contest will be governed by the laws of China, and you consent to the exclusive jurisdiction and venue of the courts of the Guangdong province for any disputes arising out of this contest. For residents of Austria only: you may withdraw your submission from this contest within seven days of your entry. If you withdraw within seven days of entry, your submission will be returned to you, and we will not make any use of your submission in the future. However, you will not be eligible to win a prize. If you do not withdraw within seven days of entry, you will be bound by the provisions of these official rules. For residents of the United Kingdom only: the provisions of the contracts (rights of third parties) act 1999 will not apply to this agreement. For residents of New Zealand only: the provisions of the contracts (privity) act of 1982 will not apply to this agreement. For Quebec residents: any litigation respecting the conduct or organization of a publicity contest may be submitted to the Regie des Alcools, des Courses et des Jeux for ruling. Any litigation respecting the awarding of a prize may be submitted to the Regie only for the purpose of helping the parties reach a settlement. For residents of Israel only: this agreement does not entitle third parties to benefits under this agreement as defined in Chapter "D" of the Contracts Act (General Part), 1973.

 

SECTION 13 Unforeseen event

If an unforeseen or unexpected event (including, but not limited to: someone cheating; a virus, bug, or catastrophic event corrupting data or the submission platform; someone discovering a flaw in the data or modalities of the challenge; very low participation in the challenge) that cannot be reasonably anticipated or controlled, (also referred to as force majeure) affects the fairness and / or integrity of this contest, we reserve the right to cancel, change or suspend this contest. This right is reserved whether the event is due to human or technical error. If a solution cannot be found to restore the integrity of the contest, we reserve the right to select winners based on the criteria specified above from among all eligible entries received before we had to cancel, change or suspend the contest.

Computer "hacking" is unlawful. If you attempt to compromise the integrity or the legitimate operation of this contest by hacking or by cheating or committing fraud in any way, we may seek damages from you to the fullest extent permitted by law. Further, we may ban you from participating in any of our future contests, so please play fairly.

 

SECTION 14 Organizer

Tencent Quantum Lab is the organizer of this contest.

Wanlida Building, Kejizhoongyi Avenue, Hi-tech Park,

Nanshan, Shenzhen.

qlab@tencent.com

 

Additional sponsors are acknowledged on the contest website.

SECTION 15 Privacy

Contest participants do not need to disclose their real identity, but must provide a valid email address where we can be deliver notifications to them regarding the contest. However, to be eligible for prizes, however, contest participants will need to disclose their real identity to contest organizers, informing them by email of their name, professional affiliation, and address. To enter the contest, the participants will need to become users of the web-based submission platform. Any profile information stored on this platform can be viewed and edited by the users. After the contest, the participants may cancel their account with the submission platform and cease to be users of that platform. All personal information will then be destroyed. The submission platform privacy policy will apply to contest information submitted by participants on that platform.