PENANG, Aug 12 (Bernama) -- Anxiety ran high during the Innovate Malaysia Design Competition (IMDC) 2016 grand finale, recently held at the Equatorial Hotel Penang on 8 and 9th August. The year-long journey first saw 264 teams from 25 Institution of Higher Learnings (IHLs) submitting their project proposals. After much training and scrutiny from the industry partners, only 45 teams managed to advance to the final stage. The event was joined by approximately 400 guests comprising of industry leaders from both local and international technology companies, educators, government agencies and other relevant stakeholders.

 

The IMDC is multi-discipline engineering design competition open to all final-year undergraduate engineering and computer science students in Malaysia. It was first introduced in 2010 and it had grown significantly over the past years. It is organized by a panel of industry organizations from Altera, Intel, Keysight Technologies, MathWorks, Microsoft, National Instruments, SilTerra/CEDEC, Motorola Solutions and Vitrox. IMDC had received tremendous support from the government and IHLs, specifically from Malaysia Digital Economy Corporation (MDEC), Talent Corporation Malaysia (TalentCorp), Malaysian Technical Universities (MTUN) and managed by Dream Catcher Consulting Sdn Bhd.

 

In conjunction with the event, Universiti Malaysia Pahang (UMP) hosted the Innovate Malaysia Design Conference (IMDCon) 2016 a day before the event. It was officiated by Deputy Minister of Science, Technology & Innovation, Datuk Dr. Abu Bakar Mohamad Diah. It was followed by a welcoming speech by Deputy Vice Chancellor Alumni and Student Affairs of UMP, Professor Dato Dr. Yusserrie Zainuddin.

 

He mentioned, “IMDCon serves as the intellectual avenue for the undergraduates from various Malaysian universities to enhance their engineering education experience, particularly in the electrical and electronics engineering discipline through constructive engagement with the representatives from the participating industries and academia. 

 

It also has expanded significantly with increased number of participation – the academia, the industry, researchers and students. Thus, with 45 technical papers scheduled to be presented in nine tracks throughout IMDCon 2016, the participants and delegates will have ample opportunity to engage in constructive discussion that contributes to knowledge dissemination and experience enrichment,” he said.

 

This year, TechSource Systems (MathWorks sole distributors in Southeast Asia) was elected as the industry host for the grand finale. The company had been a strong advocate for Internet of Things (IoT), Data Analytic trend, Model Based Design (MBD) and usage of Low-cost hardware such as Arduino, Raspi 3 and others, which is related to education among students are increased.

 

Chief Executive of TechSource Systems, Kenneth Koh said, Innovate Malaysia Design Competition encourages and ignites the innovative thinkers among the students by using the right tools across the industries, the latest products and technology that engineers and scientist globally are using today. They are very pleased to be part of the Innovate Malaysia competition, as we are able to demonstrate, educate and empower these young talents who are in the engineering and computer science fields to become more skillful and competence for the country.

 

The IMDC’s grand finale closing speech was delivered by Dato’ Ng Wan Peng, Chief Operating Officer of Malaysia Digital Economy Corporation (MDEC). In her speech, she commended on how IMDC is very much aligned to MDEC’s National ICT Initiative and National Digital Economy initiative.

 

These initiatives, among others, are aimed at advancing the country towards a developed digital economy and realize its aspiration of becoming a high income nation. This year’s IMDC had expand its focus to include Entrepreneurship, charting the path to create more Internet of Things (IoT) startups.

 

Through the Innovate Malaysia Startup Pre-accelerator, powered by MDEC, participants were taught on Lean Startup methodology and new elements in Entrepreneurship to give them the right kind of mindset to pursue their startup journey, which was also supported by Second Startup. MDEC sees this as a good platform to nurture and accelerate high potential IoT startups, a sector that we strongly support and is deemed as one of the key drivers of Digital Economy.

 

The competition participants had competed across the nine organizers’ technology track. The contestants were required to identify a real life problem or take up the challenge provided by the Design Challengers, namely Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS), Telekom Malaysia (TM), Cancer Research Malaysia (CRM) and Sime Darby. They demonstrated their inventions and pitched their ideas before the project was judged by the industry experts. It was undoubtedly a challenging yet exciting task for the judges as this year’s finalists showed excellent project accomplishment.

 

After much deliberation, the winners of each technology platform were announced as  Altera track, the winner was from Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) with their project entitled FPGA Implementation on Hearing Protection Device (HPD).

 

Intel track, the winner was from Swinburne University of Technology with their project entitled NFC-based Intelligent Parking System Utilizing Smartphones with Parking Lot Monitoring (InstantPark). Keysight Technologies track, the winner was from Universiti Teknologi MARA (UiTM) with their project entitled Electrochemical Biosensing Measurement System for Cancer Gene Detection. Followedby Universiti Malaysia Pahang (UMP) with the project title: IoT: Smart Car Monitoring System (Vehicle After Crash Alert).

 

MathWorks track, the winner was from Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) with their project entitled Development of Network Based Surveillance Module (NBSM) for the Wild. Microsoft track, the winner was from Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) with their project entitled Innova Board (Compact Body Balance Training Device).

 

Motorola Solutions track, the winner was from Universiti Malaysia Perlis (UNIMAP) with their project entitled Development of a Health Monitoring Vest for the Elderly. National Instrument track, the winner was from Universiti Teknikal Malaysia Melaka (UteM) with their project entitled Development and Analysis of Head Tracking System for Robotic Wheelchair Control.

 

SilTerra/CEDEC track, the winner was from Universiti Teknikal Malaysia Melaka (UteM) with their project entitled Design and Development of a Low Power Compact Integrated Processor of an Embedded System. Vitrox track, the winner was from Curtin University with their project entitled Camera Based Solar Tracking System.

 

The Design Challengers also took the opportunity to award the best project with the Design Challenge Award. The winners were Sime Darby challenge, the winner was from Swinburne University of Technology with their project entitled Autonomous Oil Palm Loose Fruits Collector. TM Challenge, the winner was from Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) with their project entitled Development of Flexible Platform Based on IoT for Telemedicine. WCS Challenge, the winner was from Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) with their project entitled Development of Network Based Surveillance Module (NBSM) for the Wild.

 

Swinburne University of Technology with their project NFC-based Intelligent Parking Systems Utilizing Smartphones with Parking Lot Monitoring (InstantPark) won the MDEC IOT Awards. MDEC Startup Pre-Accelerator awards were also given to five selected projects. In addition to the winners above, The Best Demo Video Award was handed to Universiti Teknologi MARA (UiTM) with their project entitled Electrochemical Biosensing Measurement System for Cancer Gene Detection. The Institute of Engineers Malaysia (IEM) awarded the Best Paper Award to Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) with their project entitled Dendritic Cell Detection Kit.

 

The ultimate recognition went to Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM) with their project entitled InnovaBoard (Compact Body Balance Training Device) as they were crowned champion and received the Innovate Malaysia Excellence Award.

 

“As Malaysia shifts away from manufacturing to R&D in line with our high-income aspirations, demand will continue to grow for talent with the ability to think critically and creatively, and who is able to  innovate and adapt to rapid industry changes,” said TalentCorp CEO Shareen Shariza  Dato’ Abdul Ghani.

 

She added, greater industry academia collaboration (IAC) as well as industry participation in the academic space is needed to ensure our graduates enter the workforce with real work experience, and in this respect, it is encouraging to see industry and academia collaborating once again on nurturing the next generation of engineering talent through the IMDC. 

Click here for Industries Leaders and Organizing Partners

Click here for winners result 2016


SOURCE:  Universiti Malaysia Pahang (UMP)

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--BERNAMA