Digital Race Final Round: Autonomous car result with the incubation of FPT

The Digital Race finale Third season took place on May, 25^th in Ha Noi among excellent technology students of top university of Vietnam (University of Engineering and Technology, Posts and Telecommunications Institute of Technology, Institute of Military Technology, Lac Hong University, University of Science, Vietnam National University Ho Chi Minh, Telecommunications University, Nha Trang University) 2 foreign teams from University of Greenwich (UK) and Far Eastern Federal University. More than 1,000 spectators came to Xuan La Sport and Recreation center along with hundred thousands of viewers watched and cheer up for 8 teams through live broadcast on VTV2, Digital Race fanpage on facebook and Vnexpress online newspaper. The competition is held by FPT Corporation and Vietnam Television. Throughout this competition, FPT wants to contribute to high qualified digital human resources, meet the need of the booming of digital transformation worldwide.

After 2 dramatic and stressful rounds, team MTA-R4F from Institute of Military Technology has become the champion if Digital Race Third season and received the award with total value of VND 1,2 billion (include 1-week trip to Silicon Valley , VND 15 million in cash, Automotive course valued VND 20 million per course and a Ph.D. Scholarship in the major of Artificial Intelligence valued VND 700 million for the most outstanding candidate).

Dramatic and intriguing race among students of the top universities in Vietnam and worldwide.

In the final round, the organizer designed the track named after many locations of Vietnam and the world and ended with Silicon Valley – America, where the champion of this year will have the chance to experience and gain knowledge of latest technology after the end of competition. The candidate had to create and apply one of the latest technology such as image processing, AI to program so as for the car to able to find the shortest way, move on random race track and overcome the road with obstacles with highest speed.

The first round in Finale was named Discover Vietnam. In this round, each team had 3 minute preparing to program the car followed the order of given race track through 5 well- known places of Vietnam such as Hanoi, Hoi An, Son Doong, Sa Pa, Cuc Phuong forest. Cars had to automatically recognize and avoid the obstacle on the map and overcome challenge of the organizer such as tunnel, shadows, road with snow, road with disappeared line. At the end of the first round, 4 teams with highest result were MTA – R4F of Institute of Military Technology, LHU The Walkers – Lac Hong University, Fast and Fiery - Posts and Telecommunications Institute of Technology and CDSNTU2 – Nha Trang University, continued to enter second round.

Second round was named To the globe. In this round, 4 teams were divided into 2 pairs (First pair: MTA – R4F of Institute of Military Technology vs CDSNTU2 – Nha Trang University, Second pair: Fast and Fiery - Posts and Telecommunications Institute of Technology vs LHU The Walkers – Lac Hong University). Given were 10 locations (include Vienam, Japan, Korea, Singapore, French, Russia, Australia, Egypt, Canada, and America) and they were randomly chosen for cars to follow to come to the final checkpoint. In 3 minutes, besides getting across obstacles and complicated race track, cars had to find shortest road and move as fast as possible to cross the final line.

After the elimination round, MTA – R4F of Institute of Military Technology and Fast and Fiery - Posts and Telecommunications Institute of Technology were two team completed the round the fastest and compete with each other in the final round. The race was extremely dramatic and stressful while two teams were chasing each other to finish the round. In the end, with stable strategy and skills, team MTA – R4F of Institute of Military Technology was the first to finish the round from Vietnam to Silicon Valley of America with the time recorded as 52 seconds and successfully became the new champion of Digital Race Third season. This is also the second time that Institute of Military Technology has won the competition.

With intelligence, skills and stable strategy, Institute of Military Technology has won the Digital Race Third Season.

Emotionally become the winner of Digital Race Third Season, Lai Tien De, leader of MTA – R4F shared “After 2 years participating in Digital Race, our efforts has finally paid off. The challenges of this year competition was more difficult than last year. However, my team can overcome them and become the winner due to solid underlying of knowledge that has been contributed since last year’s competition”

The value chain for the young in Vietnam by the incubation of FPT.

Digital Race third season came to an end witnessing the mature of many technology students. From this playground, they were able to seek knowledge and expose the many latest technology around the globe that FPT is now pioneering in Vietnam. Up to now, not only has they perceived the standardized and basic autonomous knowledge but also they have had chance to apply to solve some practical challenge on autonomous car in reality. Moreover, they were able to expose to international environment while competing with 2 foreign teams, to experience one of the top hi-tech countries such as Japan, America. Therefore, besides knowledge, they gained more confidence and soft skill such as teamwork to be ready in joining the digital transformation process around the globe.

Not only is the technology playground for students. Digital Race has inspired for the young to participate in research for the development and application of latest technology, especially in autonomous field. There have been many research clubs about robot and autonomous car in many universities (such as Autonomous car club of FPT University, Comlap Club of Lac Hong University, so on). Some university has invested to buy facilities and hold the competition within the university, helping students to improve the learning ability and develop technology like Telecommunications University.

Speaking at the event, Mr. Truong Gia Binh - Chairman of the Board of Directors of FPT Corporation highlighted: “There are 3 ongoing autonomous car programming competitions in the world. They are the competition held by Audi for students in Germany, by Amazon for programmers in America and by FPT for students in Vietnam and worldwide. Today, Digital has become international playground. Vietnam also had pioneering and world-class playground. The champion of this competition will not only receive physical award and experience in America but more importantly have the chance to get the Ph.D. scholarship majoring in Artificial Intelligence to upgrade levels of themselves and contribute to the country. I want to impress that the winner of this competition is only a small part, the most importantly we has already won the will and the desire to upgrade Vietnam to another level”.

In Vietnam, FPT is one of the minor corporate that has invested in long term to form a playground for the young, by which contributed to high quality digital human resources for Vietnam. Over the past 20 years, FPT has always been the leading company in holding many technology competitions for the young including Vietnam Intelligence (2000-2007), Mobile Lab (2008-2009), Mobile Robot Challenge (2013), S.M.A.C Challenge (2014 – 2015), Digital Race (2016 to now).