Award Ceremony of the 2nd Smart City Microchip Design Competition

The second competition was launched in December 2024, and after only 6 months, there were 68 registered design projects from 27 universities, an increase of 71% compared to the first season. Nearly 300 contestants from all three regions of the North - Central - South gathered together, demonstrating creativity and developing core technologies.

Through the preliminary round, practical training with the guidance of experienced experts from Synopsys, Cadence, Tresemi, the university projects have completed the ideas and design process on international standard software.

The teams presented their projects to the panel of judges.

In the final round, the teams presented their projects to the Jury and were evaluated based on technological completeness, practical application, incubation and commercialization potential.

According to Associate Professor Dr. Le Quoc Cuong, Deputy Head of the Management Board of Ho Chi Minh City High-Tech Park, the second competition has made significant progress in both the academic depth and practicality of the topics. The quality of the projects has been raised, and the design products have been based on the trend of integrating modern technology.

Many topics have gone beyond the old microchip design technical framework to approach interdisciplinary and systematic microchip design fields such as: Integrating artificial intelligence accelerators, hardware encryption, high-speed communication (BUS IP), energy harvesting applications in quantum technology, renewable energy, smart transportation, healthcare and digital transformation... This is a very positive signal, showing the development potential of young microchip design engineers in Vietnam.

Assoc. Prof. Dr. Le Quoc Cuong, Deputy Head of the Management Board of Ho Chi Minh City High-Tech Park, spoke at the closing ceremony.

“We are proud that from this competition, many groups of candidates have been approached by CNC enterprises, inviting them to cooperate and develop further. Many young people have expressed their desire to return to SHTP to start a technology business, becoming professional microchip designers. Without human resources, semiconductor strategy is just a manifesto; without an innovation ecosystem, technological ideas are difficult to become products; without proactive policies, the microchip industry will forever remain at potential,” Associate Professor, Dr. Le Quoc Cuong emphasized.

The Organizing Committee hopes to continue to receive support from organizations, businesses and the community in developing high-quality human resources for the microchip industry. This is an important step to help Vietnam move closer to its goal of becoming a leading microchip design center in the region and the world .

The results of the 2nd Smart City Microchip Design Competition 2024 are as follows:

First prize went to the project Designing a RISC-V microcontroller with integrated hard coding for energy saving - University of Information Technology (VNU-HCM).

Second prize belongs to Digital camera ASIC project - University of Technology (VNU-HCM).

Third prize went to the project Designing AES-128 encryption/decryption IP on ASICs - University of Science and Technology (University of Danang); the project Buck DC-DC converter responding promptly to a wide load range - Hanoi University of Industry.

The Organizing Committee awarded the first prize to the candidate of the University of Information Technology (VNU-HCM)

In addition, the organizing committee also awarded 3 consolation prizes, 4 promising prizes, 1 aspiration nurturing prize and additional prizes to teams with outstanding achievements.

BUI TUAN

Source: https://www.sggp.org.vn/trao-giai-cuoc-thi-thiet-ke-vi-mach-cho-do-thi-thong-minh-lan-2-post795671.html