b'Member News March 2020 13The future of engineeringPresenting brillianceWhat opportunities have come from winning PATW?Post the PATW Finals, at the Presidents to the world Dinner following the Presidents Address, my colleague Amrut and I interacted with Anirudh Koul, the recipient of the IET Mike Sargeant Career Achievement medal, a On 24 October 2019 at the IET Achievement Awards,former senior data scientist at Microsoft, and the current Head of Research at Padmanabhan Krishnamurthy, third-year student of ComputerAira (which provides artificial intelligence Science at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technologysolutions for the visually impaired). Not and Asia Pacific Representative, was crowned winner of our only were we delighted to meet such an IET Present Around The World (PATW) global competition. influential figure in the world of AI-centric accessibility solutions, we were over the moon when Mr Koul offered to advise What is PATW? The winning presentation us on how to take Helen further, both technologically and market-wise. A global competition for youngCompeting for the ultimate title,After we returned to Hong Kong - and professionals, graduates, apprenticesPadmanabhan introduced the judgescontinued to correspond with Mr Koul and students within engineeringand audience of world-leading- he connected us to the organisers of aged 18-30 to develop and showcaseengineers to HelenAn AccessibilityRe-Work, a leading deep learning and AI their presentation skills, enhanceDevice for AI-based Lip Reading.applications summit held every year in their knowledge and make invaluableHelen is a wearable camera thatSan Francisco. We shared our progress connections.performs automated lipreading usingand ambitions regarding Helen with Specifically, its a 10-minute presentationdeep learning. It can supplement hearingRe-Work, and were honoured when which is judged on presentation skillsaids in noisy environments (by lipreadingwe received an invitation from them to (70 per cent) and its technical contentand transcribing spoken content) andspeak at this years conference at the (30 per cent) with five minutes forenable audio independent communicationend of January. Presenting our work at questions from the judges and audience. where speech recognition fails. ForRe-Work in the presence of industry Padmanabhan and his co-creator Amrut,leaders from OpenAI and Microsoft, and With various stages and exciting prizesthe goal was to design a device that canresearchers from MIT and UC Berkeley, is involved, the competition is open to IEThelp the hearing impaired interact withnot something that we could have ever members and non-members.the world more easily. envisioned a few months ago.We caught up with Padmanabhan followingWatching on as stalwarts like Sir Peter his top-prize win to talk next steps for HelenKnight and Professor Chenming Hu - and his night at the Achievement Awards. about whom I had read so much - were awarded the Faraday and JJ Thomson What was it like being at theMedals was quite surreal, while hearing Achievement Awards? about Warrant Officer Kay Howells daring bomb disposal feats and the The entire experience, right from Drmonumental contributions made by the Peter Bonfields speech on the eve of theother awardees to their fields was a truly awards, to the awards ceremony itselfvisceral and galvanising experience. was extremely insightful. Getting to meet like-minded young engineers from aroundA special word of thanks to the IETs the world, and learning of their work inYoung Professional Engagement teamsubjects like mental health and biofueland the entire Achievement Awardsgeneration for space stations, was inspiringteam for welcoming us so warmly and and served as a timely reminder of themaking sure that our time at Savoyincredible impact we can make throughPlace was productive and enriching.innovative and comprehensible research. If you think youve got what it takes to compete on the global finalstage like Padmanabhan, find out how to get involved at: theiet.org/patwIET Present Around The World (PATW) global competition winner 2019, Padmanabhan Krishnamurthy'