The Philips Young Inventors' Challenge announced its innovative young winners recently. IZUAN SHAH marvelled at a whole assembly of inventions for the disabled that were both smart and heartfelt.
THEY are good role models. They could be heroes to people who look up to them because they are not only bright, young and capable in the field of technology, but also socially aware, which is something we hoped to uncover with this challenge,” said Datuk Dr Mohamed Arif Nun, chief judge of the Philips Young Inventors' Challenge of the young participants at the recent prize-giving ceremony.
“It's not just about getting 15As – there is an over-focus on exams,” he added, referring to the tragic trend of late where young people take their own lives upon “failing” to emulate their straight-A “heroes”.
Now in its second year, the Philips Young Inventors' Challenge is organised by Philips Malaysia Sdn Bhd. Philips's current “Sense and Simplicity” tagline is the crux of the competition, designed to seek out the best example of containing practicality and creativity within a potential patented invention or future Philips product.
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| The team from Universiti Teknologi Malaysia: (from left) team adviser Yeong Che Fai, Tan Zee Yean, Tan Ping Hua, hearing-impaired team supporter Kevin Mak and Heap Yee Sim. – Photo by JOEL CHAN |
“Light Speed Café” and “iReader & CarlD” won second and third place.
“Light Speed Café”, the brainchild of UPM engineering students Mohd Sharazel Razalli, Sharuzzaman Ahmat Raslan, Chan Jiunn Wen and Izman Haidi Mohd Ibrahim, is a Radio Frequency Identification-based (RFID-based) caféteria innovation to help orders move faster during the lunch hour stampede, using a chip-reading mechanism. “iReader & CarlD” is a data reading and storing system that provides a tech-savvy solution to the pain of settling one's summonses.
Both proved simple enough to use, and offered a sensible approach to solving prickly everyday problems and social congestion common in any modern metropolis. But it took something with an extra bit of inspiration and intent to stand out in the competition.
Genuinely ingenious
First place went to an ingenious device designed to bring those who are deaf and dumb closer to the rest of the world with a user-friendly, attachable gadget that is supposed to reduce alienation for individuals, raise their self-esteem and let them have equal prospects for a happy social life at home and on the job.
“Hello!” was conceived by a bright young trio to help the deaf and dumb “to feel like normal people” by enabling them to communicate via sign language through the device's advanced movement-to-audio signal processing system.
The winning invention came from a UTM team, comprising Tan Ping Hua, 22, Tan Zee Yean, 21, Heap Yee Sim, 21, and their adviser Yeong Che Fai.
Said team leader Ping Hua: “We had to decide on the best way to help the disabled, not the best way to win (the competition).”
“Hello!” is a portable micro-controller that helps a deaf or dumb person “talk” through a voice-machine that vocally expresses whatever the person motions it to, thanks to a simple word-gesture association feature that the trio created for the system.
“We were cracking our heads during discussions for what our invention would be, and the only thing we knew was that we wanted to make something that would help disabled people in a way that maybe hasn't been done before. And so we felt that this (“Hello!” device) was the most interesting way to do so,” added Ping Hua, who is an electrical engineering student.
With a MCB 2130 development board as the central brain unit of the gadget, the “Hello!” project fulfilled the judges' criterion for selecting a winning invention that utilised Philips Semiconductors thrust products. The micro-controller and the RFID, innovatively catered to the disabled, displayed a sense of social awareness and purpose to help a minority group through a safe and environmentally-friendly invention.
The entry also had a clearer chance of winning if it showed style amidst the practical elements and was presented well at the final exhibition.
For their “Hello!” effort, the group took home a trophy, bagged some cool Philips hampers and pocketed a whopping RM10,000, all the better for their congratulatory trip to Beijing and Shanghai – just reward for a gruelling three-month dash in-between regular UTM classes to finish the project from idea to prototype.
“We have no plans yet because we never thought we could win,” Ping Hua humbly replied, when asked how they'll spend the prize money.
The brainy group came together last year when all three were representing Malaysia at the ABU Asia-Pacific Robot Contest in Bejing.
Shared Zee Yean, on how they formed the winning combination: “We mingled there and came to work closely with each other for a year. We are course mates but we only became a group during the experience at the Robo Con. Then our adviser urged us to dedicate ourselves to another project, and enter this competition. We have so many people to thank – Che Fai, our university – and Philips have been so encouraging.”
Taking nothing away from the second-placed “Light Speed Café” and third-placed “iReader & CarlD”, as well as the 11 other unique entries, the Philips Young Inventors' Challenge was another swift step towards increasing value in creativity, human capital and soft-skill development – all qualities too easily overlooked in the blinding world of professional technology creation.