Engineering & IT Case Competition
What is the Engineering & IT Case Competition?
The competition takes place once a year and provides Engineering and Information Technology students with the opportunity to work within a multidisciplinary team and craft responses to a genuine industry challenge.
The Engineering & IT Case Competition provides students with an opportunity to:
- Network with industry representatives
- Be a part of a team
- Contribute ideas to a real life scenario
- Apply what you have learned in the classroom
- Sharpen your professional skills
- Develop your industry experience
- Win some great prizes!
GUIDE FOR INDUSTRY
The Case Competition is an opportunity for Engineering and IT students to develop creative solutions to a real-world industry challenge. The event is held in Semester 2 every year with students coming together to form multidisciplinary teams, bringing with them knowledge from each of their courses to contribute to their response.
In 2022, electrical engineering student, Zachari Orelowitz partnered with Abigail Bloom from environmental engineering and Ben Field from biomedical engineering to produce a project design on ‘Solar Panel recycling’ which won first prize at the competition.
“Working in a team was fantastic with each member of our team having a different history. It's been really fun to combine all our skills together to come up with the project.” -Zachari Orelowitz
What are the benefits?
Industry partners will be able to collaborate and network with students, provide feedback and guidance, as well as learn from the next generation of problem solvers.
They might even consider sponsoring worthy ideas to help the students develop them into real-world applications that could assist their own companies.
Students receive insight into some of the predominant challenges facing engineering and tech industries today and thereby develop the latest skills necessary to resolve these problems, along with industry support.
“We're now working with Elecsome to try to find a way to use our project more. Even though we’ve finished with the Case Competition, we’re still working with the industry partner and working on this technology.” -Zachari Orelowitz
What does an industry-student partnership look like?
For the Case competition, industry partners and students work together to solve a problem. The students create a concept design that can assist the partner with a particular project or develop a new process. For Elecsome, the Case Competition was about improving how we can recycle and upcycle solar panels to avoid waste. As a business, that’s what they do, and it came down to the students to find ways to improve that process. By looking at additional components to recycle or new ways to extract value, the project gave Ben, Abigail and Zachari the chance to put their skills to the test.
For their project, Zachari, Abigail and Ben worked with Elecsome, “Australia's first solar panel upcycling plant" to develop their response to ‘How we can we use the natural environment and biology to recycle metals from solar panels?’. Elecsome was able to support their design along the way.
“Elecsome has been really excited to work with us to pull off this idea – and working with an industry partner that’s passionate about this makes it easy to work with them. As a team, we’ve been able to bring our different skills and perspectives from our fields of engineering and then Elecsome has been able to give us ideas about how this kind of work gets put into practice and their existing processes.” - Zachari Orelowitz
How the competition will run
Student teams will engage in a series of workshops to guide them through their projects. This competition is held in two stages, with the final stage culminating in a design concept proposal presentation to a panel of industry judges.
Through this process, the team was able to receive consultation from Elecsome and were guided through the development of their design. “We had a couple of discussions with Elecsome about their existing processes to get a bit more detail.” - Abigail Bloom
Further information
For more information, you can submit your enquiries to engit-studentenrich@unimelb.edu.au.
Participate in the 2022 competition
- 2022 Case competition participation was delivered in a hybrid model.
- Learn more about how the competition works.
Why take part?
Be recognised with Melbourne Plus
Melbourne Plus is a new University of Melbourne program and is your opportunity to be recognised for your participation in co-curricular activities! It is all about rewarding the knowledge, skills and behaviours you develop when participating in these activities.
As part of the case competition, you are developing your capability in innovation.
Once you complete your time with case competition, you will be invited to reflect on your development via a Melbourne Plus LMS community. Once you submit your reflection you will receive a digital credential that you can share with your networks.
As part of the participating in the case competition, you have early access to Melbourne Plus. A wide range of activities will be available from Semester 2 onwards, when the program will become available to all students.
Who can apply?
The 2022 Case competition was delivered in a hybrid format to allow all students to participate regardless of where they are located.
Each team consisted entirely of students in Melbourne who can attend sessions face to face, as well as students overseas who can attend sessions virtually or a combination of both. Location was not a hindrance, and all students were accommodated to create a valuable experience for all participants.
Teams were expected to be multidisciplinary and consisted of 4 or 5 students who were enrolled in in at least two of the following disciplines of engineering or computer information systems. These include
- Master of Engineering (suite of programs) including Master of Engineering Management students
- Master of Information Systems
- Master of Information Technology
- Master of Energy Systems
- Master of Computer Science
All teams benefited from having a broad range of disciplines represented in their team. As some teams consisted of students undertaking degrees other than a Master of Engineering, they were encouraged to have students undertaking an engineering degree within their team.
How does it work?
Once teams were registered, they were invited to attend their first workshop to confirm team members and be presented with some invaluable information to prepare for the case competition. This is where the case study problem was revealed.
Note: All teams were required to participate in this event. *This session was recorded and shared with students in a private Canvas community for competition participants. All other workshops held at later date relating to the case competition were also compulsory and students were expected to attend.
Teams then submitted a two-page document in Stage 1 of the competition that addresses the Case Competition problem.
Final teams progressed to Stage 2 of the competition and were required to attend a compulsory preparation workshop. From here, finalist teams presented their final presentation to a panel of industry judges.
This year, one team was awarded the winning prize and named winners of the Faculty of Engineering and Information Technology (FEIT) Case Competition!
Prizes
First place through Third Place teams won a share prize of $4,500.
Finalists
Each finalist received a certificate of acknowledgement.
More information
Questions about the competition can be sent to engit-studentenrich@unimelb.edu.au.
Previous case studies and competition winners
Each competition challenge is developed in collaboration with industry. The winning team will be awarded the perpetual trophy, take part in an onsite tour at an industry premises, and undertake a mentoring opportunity with an industry professional.
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2022 Competition
Winning team: Solar System Solutions
Zach Orelowitz, Ben Field, and Abby Bloom
Case summary
The 2022 Case Competition provided students with the opportunity to propose an innovative upcycling solution to solar panel waste e.g., the dismantling and removal process, the logistic and transportation, the processing of solar panel waste, and the end use of the processed materials. The case and prizes were generously provided by Elecsome.
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2021 Competition
Winning team: Lime Engineering
Shawn Ingle, Broderick Overton, Tom McMahon, David Fogarty and Damon Ginevra
Case summary
The 2021 Case Competition provided students with the opportunity to conceptually design a net zero carbon future fuels infrastructure solution. The case and prizes were generously provided by Future Fuels CRC.
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2020 competition
Winning team: The Socially-Distanced Superstars
Matthew Khowira, Simone Costello, Clive Wang, Alexandra Wigley and Miro Bell
Case summary
Teams participating in the 2020 Case Competition were required to present concept designs for an innovative and forward-thinking discrete renewable energy solution for the Parkville Station precinct, as part of the Metro Tunnel Project – the biggest ever public transport project in the state. The renewable energy design also required a community education component.
The case and prizes were generously provided by CYP Design & Construction, who will deliver the Tunnels and Stations package for the Metro Tunnel Project.
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2019 Competition
Winning team: T.T. Consulting
Khoa Tran, Karina Lee, Jacky Li, Dean Peach and Steven Lam
Case summary
The 2019 Case Study Competition saw student teams create a bid document that presented a innovative transport link to the Fishermans Bend Employment Precinct. Fishermans Bend is an important area of growth for population, economic, employment and education/research in Victoria. The Employment Precinct will include the new Faculty of Engineering and Information Technology (FEIT) campus and the transport link that the teams created needed to identify a was that guests visiting the area could enter through a impressive Innovation Precinct Gateway whilst seamlessly proceeding to the Employment Precinct.
The 2019 Case Competition was provided by WSP Australia.
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2018 Competition
Winning team: Loads, Diodes and Cathodes
Nathaniel de Bell, Dominique Ling, Arthur Masion and Tony Srour
Case summary
The 2018 Case Competition provided student groups with the opportunity to present their ideas for the repurposing and decommission of two ExxonMobil offshore platforms in the Bass Strait. Ideas were judged both on their feasibility and creativity.
The case was delivered by ExxonMobil, who also generously donated a 12 month mentoring experience and site visit to the winning team.
The 2018 Case Competition was provided by ExxonMobil.
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2017 Competition
Winning team: MEMB Consulting
Benjamin Appuhamy, Kulaghan Kumaradevan, Kevin Ngo and Vishwesh Sridhar
Case summary
Student groups participating in the 2017 competition received a project brief providing some background to the FEIT Campus II project. A set of considerations and criteria were delivered by AECOM, a multinational engineering consultancy and construction firm.
Each team provided a bidding document which outlined design concepts for the Campus II project. Six teams then progressed to the finals where they presented their ideas to a panel of industry judges.
The top two teams received a 12 month mentoring experience and site visit, generously donated by AECOM and ExxonMobil.
The 2017 Case Competition challenge was provided by AECOM.
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2016 Competition
Winning team: Brief-case
Rupert Allan, Jason Lam, Albert Chang, Vlad Litvinenko and Irene Chandra
Case summary
Groups in the 2016 competition received a project brief asking them to review the use of an under-utilised desalination plant to supply a rural site. Within this simulated case study, a senior engineer assigned each group with the task of presenting the basic material required to bid on a call for tender for a rural water infrastructure project; the intention was to persuade a visiting division head that the team is equipped to bid for the project, and to solicit advice on how to proceed.
The student groups were presented with the case and delivered their bid presentation all on the same day, highlighting the teams adaptability and creativity in pitching their ideas.
The top team received a mentoring experience and site visit generously donated by ExxonMobil.