Samsung SMARTathon 2017:
Coding the Smart way

Samsung R&D Institute-Delhi recently organized a national level SMARTathon, a 24-hour contest on advanced software development and coding, inviting participants from the best engineering institutes in India.

The event was a great success, principally aimed at generating interest among the student community of various Indian Technology Institutes and bringing together young talent in a unified forum. The contest was hosted at India's top tech institute, the Indian Institute of Technology-Delhi (IIT-Delhi), in collaboration with FITT (Foundation for Innovation and Technology Transfer).

FITT is an industrial interface organization at IIT-Delhi which was established as a Registered Society on 9th July 1992. FITT's mission is to be an effective interface with the technology industry, and to foster, promote and sustain the commercialization of science and technology for mutual benefit. Teaming up with FITT has been a significant step for Samsung in fostering our relationships with the top Indian academic institutions and enhancing their industrial interface programs.

▲ Dr. Kaushik Saha, CTO at SRI-D, addressing participants at the start of the event

The contest drew a lot of attention and created a lot of excitement among the talented students at these prestigious institutes. Invitations were sent to several colleges in India and we received close to 30 applications, from which the 10 best teams were selected based on their submitted proposals. The buzz was created by placing standees, distributing brochures and running flash news on Samsung video walls at the IITs, preparations for which started 3 months in advance.

On the morning of the event, Dr. Kaushik Saha, CTO at Samsung R&D Delhi, delivered the opening address. He shared his ideas about how the SMARTathon is a platform for young minds to explore and to gain an understanding of the real-time problems they will face as part of their future corporate lives. Director Sukhyun Chung, Dispatcher at SRI-Delhi, also talked to the students about Samsung, and kicked off the event by wishing them luck and offering them souvenirs.

Mr. Vineet Paliwal, Head of the SVC Development Group, said, "IIT-Delhi is special for Samsung because of its proximity to our R&D centers in Delhi NCR and also because a large proportion of their students join SRI-Delhi every year."

The students were scored on the following factors:

• Innovation in their solution approach
• Solution architecture
• Solution design
• Solution functionality & correctness
• Optimization steps

▲ Students giving demo of their projects to the panel of judges during the event

The winning teams were from IIT Delhi, IIT Kharagpur and IIITDM Jabalpur.

The winners were offered some exciting prizes including a Samsung Note 8 (first prize), a Samsung LED 43" Smart TV (second prize), a Samsung J7 NXT (third prize) and other Samsung goodies.

Bhanu Prakash Reddy Guda from IIT Kharagpur said, "Samsung is always close to our hearts and has touched our lives in more ways than one. The innovation Samsung offers is mind-blowing and we look forward to seeing the next big thing they come out with."

At this never-before-seen event, IIT administrators, professors, and academic staff, along with the Samsung R&D CTO and MD, all came together to showcase their talents, connect and collaborate at the Samsung SMARTathon.

The Guest of Honor, Mr. YoungKi Byun, Managing Director of Samsung R&D Institute India-Delhi, together with the Deputy Director of IIT-Delhi, was invited to award the prizes and congratulate the winners.

Thanks to the success of this event, SRI-Delhi is planning to expand the extent and scope of the SMARTathon to include other campuses across India. This move will definitely help Samsung to further nurture our pre-established bond with India's academic community, and to identify the young talent with the greatest potential.