MAKING WAVES WITH THEIR MARITIME INNOVATIONS

The inaugural Maritime RobotX Challenge closed on 26 Oct with the 170-odd student participants going away with a greater appreciation and passion for solving complex challenges with technology.

The participants, who came from 15 universities from five countries - Australia, Japan, Singapore, South Korea, and the United States competed in outfitting a 16-foot long standard maritime platform - named the Wave Adaptive Modular Vessel or WAM-V - with sensors, computers, and software in order to complete missions such as autonomous navigation and control.

Team MIT-Olin from the US emerged tops, winning overall first and a prize of $20,000. Second place went to Team Angry Nerds of the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology from South Korea, while Team QUT from the Queensland University of Technology of Australia clinched the third spot.

Held in Singapore at The Float @ Marina Bay, the first edition of the Challenge was jointly organised by the National University of Singapore (NUS) Faculty of Engineering, Science Centre Singapore, and the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International Foundation.

Guest-of-Honour at the opening ceremony on 24 Oct was Major-General (NS) Ng Chee Khern, Permanent Secretary (Defence Development) and 2nd Permanent Secretary (Health).

In his opening address, MG (NS) Ng highlighted the importance of defence technology research & development (R&D), saying: "As a small city-state with no natural resources, Singapore cannot take what we have achieved today for granted. We therefore recognise that technology is a critical factor in overcoming our constraints."

Elaborating on the importance of defence technology to the Singapore Armed Forces (SAF), he said: "The SAF leverages on technology so that it can achieve its mission with less manpower resources."

Professor Chan Eng Soon, NUS Vice Provost (Special Duties), and co-chair of the Maritime RobotX Challenge agreed with MG (NS) Ng, noting that Singapore has a need for Engineering talent. Hence, in his welcome address, he shared: "We hope that today's Maritime RobotX Challenge will put the passion and fun back into Engineering.

"To all who share this passion for curiosity, discovery, and solving complex challenges, I appeal to you to hold on to this fire. Follow your passion, and you will not regret it."

Passion was something that the participating teams did not lack. Said Mr Joey Lim, 24, from Nanyang Technological University's team Leviathan: "I think that this challenge was a very good learning experience. No doubt it was very difficult, especially for a green team like us, but it was unforgettable."

Mr Tamilarasan s/o Teyagarajan, from Team Sharky of NUS also had fond memories of the competition, though the journey was not entirely smooth sailing. "The first thing I learnt is that nothing goes according to plan," he said. "However, that taught us to think on the spot.

"Unforeseen challenges aside, this competition gave me a valuable opportunity to apply the academic lessons that I have learnt in the classroom to a real life situation."

This competition also yielded many new opportunities to Mr Jaron Lee from the Singapore University of Technology and Design (SUTD). He said: "This competition gave us exposure to very advanced technology that we do not usually come across in our undergraduate studies. For example, we usually work with small radio controlled platforms as compared to the WAM-V of this competition.

"As a result, one of the major learning points of this competition was how to keep things simple such that the mechanics and software were not too complex."

The Challenge, which organisers plan to hold biennially, is an experiential learning platform that leverages science, technology, engineering and mathematics education, to promote and highlight the importance of Science and Engineering in the area of defence technology R&D.