SMU-SCIS Team Triumphs at SCDF and DELL Lifesavers' Innovation Challenge 2023 Hackathon
A team of SMU-SCIS students recently made waves at the Singapore Civil Defence Force (SCDF) and DELL Lifesavers’ Innovation Challenge 2023 hackathon by clinching the top prize. They also won the Best Cloud Native Technologies award.
The team embarked on a mission to revolutionise emergency response systems using AI (Computer Vision) models and public CCTVs to detect fire or medical emergencies. Their innovative approach enabled prompt sharing of crucial incident details, such as location and images with SCDF. By bridging the time gap between the occurrence of an incident and SCDF's notification, their solution facilitates faster and more accurate resource planning and activation, significantly enhancing emergency response capabilities.
Tan Yee Sen, a fast-track Year 3 SMU SCIS Information Systems and Master of IT in Business (MITB) Analytics student was tasked to research and train computer vision models (transfer learning). He also explored the integration of zero-shot classification with Contrastive Language–Image Pre-training (CLIP) for the solution and creating an inference script while his teammates focused on integrating the models with telegram bots (notifications), Amazon Web Services (AWS S3, AWS Interactive Video), and deployment.
The team's dedication and ingenuity paid off immensely, as they emerged victorious in the hackathon, clinching 1st place, and also received the Best Cloud Native Technologies award. Their remarkable achievement is a testament to their exceptional skills, creativity, and collaborative spirit.
From left to right: Jowett Chng Kai Cheng, Faisal Ichsan Samudra, Ezekiel Ghe, Tan Yee Sen & Lee Wei Khiang.
Reflecting on his experience, Yee Sen attributes much of his success to his education in the SMU-Master of IT in Business (MITB) Fast Track programme. He highlighted the valuable insights gained from the Text Analytics & Applications module, which helped him comprehend and digest research papers and articles relevant to their project. Having classmates who are working professionals from diverse industries in the MITB programme has also provided him with invaluable professional exposure broadening his understanding of real-world challenges. Yee Sen also added that the seminar-style teaching approach at SMU emphasized effective communication and presentation skills, which have proven crucial in conveying their ideas to the judges, especially those without a technical background.
We are incredibly proud of Yee Sen and the entire team for their exceptional accomplishment. Their success serves as an inspiration to our student community of how innovation and collaboration can bring about transformative change in the field of emergency response.
Let us recognize and applaud the outstanding individuals who contributed to this remarkable achievement:
- Tan Yee Sen (Fast Track Master of IT in Business, Year 3 SMU SCIS Information Systems)
- Ezekiel Ghe (Year 3 SMU SCIS Information Systems)
- Faisal Ichsan Samudra (Year 3 SMU SCIS Information Systems)
- Jowett Chng Kai Cheng (Fast Track MSc Computing, Year 3 SMU SCIS Information Systems)
- Lee Wei Khiang (Year 3 SMU SCIS Information Systems)
