National-level Hackathon to Develop India-specific ADAS Products

Vehicle-based intelligent safety systems that could improve road safety in collision avoidance, distracted driving, overspeeding, crash severity mitigation, drunken driving, automatic post-crash notification of collision, and so on are ADAS. For example, intelligent speed adaptation and advanced braking systems can potentially prevent a crash or mitigate the severity of a collision. In India, adopting such technology requires studying road user behaviour (driver and pedestrians) and vehicle control features that can be monitored/ influenced to develop products to improve road safety.

CoERS, IIT Madras, launched a Hackathon to develop India-specific Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) on March 31st, 2023. The Hackathon, supported by HL Mando Anand India Limited, commenced in May 2023 with 47 initial participants and various evaluation rounds. The Grand Finale of the Hackathon was conducted on December 1, 2023, where participants from the industry and academia presented their solutions and provided live demonstrations. The top three Hackathon winners were chosen and awarded.

Team Safety Guardians, Chalapathi Institute of Technology, RGUKT Nuzvid, and IIT Bombay for the Bike Safety Enhancement System bagged the first prize. Their idea included a dedicated mobile application and integrated motorcycle-tailored hardware, which ensures swift accident detection and utilises algorithms to identify rash driving behaviours, including sudden acceleration.

Team Safety Sentinels from IIT Roorkee for the Real-Time Lane Departure Warning System using LiDAR received the second prize. The system has a mechanism for lane marking identification using sparse point cloud data, addressing gaps in existing data by detecting various vehicle movements based on their severity levels. The algorithm operates in real-time, enhancing lane keeping behaviour and preventing unintended lane departures.

Team Tons of Tech from Prince Shri Venkateshwara Engineering College for Assistance for First Responders (AFR) received the third prize. AFR is a device to help ambulances go past the Traffic Signals without wasting precious time