PES University students win 1 lakh cash prize in Wabtec competition Exceed 2.0

Wabtec Corporation announced the winners of the company’s 2022-23 “Exceed Campus Challenge” in India. The winning teams developed innovative proposals for a range of technical challenges facing the rail industry. Team Pastra from PES University, Bengaluru who presented their solution on ‘Artificial Intelligence for Safety in Industrial Sites’ were judged as the winners of the challenge. The three-membered team - Achal Shetty, Mohit Venkatesh and Alokpunj Bagrodia are students from the B.Tech 6 th semester Electronics and Communication Engineering department.The team was awarded a cash prize of Rs 1 Lakh.

Team Pastra from PES University was among 149 teams with more than 500 students from 36 colleges across India participating in the challenge. Of the 149 teams, eight qualified for the finale round and presented their projects to the leadership at Wabtec India Technology and Engineering Centre in ITC Green Centre Tech Park, Bengaluru. The finale round witnessed tough competition from colleges such as Cummins College Pune, PSG Tech Coimbatore, VIT Bhopal, KIIT Bhubaneshwar, SVNIT Surat, and NIT Calicut. The eight finalists also had an opportunity to visit various labs of Wabtec and understand the buzzing tech behind the railroad industry.

Team Pastra presented an Artificial Intelligence-based software solution to enhance and supervise the safety of workers performing operations in heavy-duty industrial sites such as railway yards and other manufacturing and repair units. The proposed model can be implemented with the existing surveillance cameras installed at workspaces. The team developed a website fully stacked with algorithms to detect the wearing of safety equipment such as safety helmets and reflective vests by the workers on a real-time basis and alert the supervisor in case of any non-compliance in the required safety norms set by the company.

Prof. M R Doreswamy, Chancellor of the University heartily congratulated the students on their achievement.