Hack-A-Bot 2025: IMX500 Powers 24-hour Student Hackathon
Culminating in a dynamic 24-hour sprint, Hack-A-Bot 2025 at The University of Manchester saw nearly 300 students packing the place, creating an electrifying (and heavily caffeinated) weekend on March 29-30. They brought creativity, problem-solving, and some serious technical skills to the table. This annual 24-hour hackathon, welcoming students of all levels from first-years to PhD candidates, fuelled a shared mission: building impactful tech solutions across three distinct challenges. With minds from neuroscience, mechanical, electrical, and software engineering coming together, the event became a dynamic space for fresh ideas and collaboration.
Hacking for Campus Solutions: The IMX500 AI Vision Challenge
The students, working in teams of four, were given 24 hours to work through three challenges. One of these was to take the Raspberry Pi AI Camera with Sony's IMX500 integrated sensor and use it to find ways to make campus life easier. Driven by the university's desire to improve the daily flow of a busy campus, they were challenged to get creative with AI-powered vision and neural networks.
The IMX500's on-module AI processor enabled students to create impactful solutions, ranging from attendance and emotion tracking to sign language translation, demonstrating AI's power in everyday applications.
And the Winner is... BagAlert!
While all teams presented impressive ideas, one project stood out for its well-thought-through concept, seamless user interaction, versatility in IoT technologies, and outstanding execution. BagAlert, the winning project, addressed a universal student concern: secure personal belongings. By integrating RFID technology with the IMX500's real-time object detection, BagAlert created a robust monitoring system that activates with a simple tap. It’s like giving your bag its own personal bodyguard, and features:
- Easy Activation: Users tap an RFID tag or student card to activate the system before stepping away.
- Smart Object Detection: The system catalogs and identifies objects in view, such as laptops, bags, and phones.
- Continuous Monitoring: If an item is moved, the system promptly detects the change.
- Real-Time Alerts: Any disturbance triggers an alert, highlighting the affected object and recording evidence.
- Seamless Deactivation: Users tap their RFID tag upon return to deactivate protection.
Special congratulations to Joshua Alliet, Kai Yang, Dylan Simpson, and Hugo Rydel for their exceptional work on this winning project.
Hack-A-Bot continues to grow in scale and ambition. Last year’s challenge featured Sony Spresense hardware, allowing students to develop solutions that assist technicians in their daily tasks within the University’s Makerspace. This year’s challenge was all about AI-powered vision, spotlighting Sony’s IMX500 sensor in the Raspberry AI camera and allowing students to explore the possibilities and requirements of real-time Vision AI on embedded systems.
To all the teams who participated: congratulations! It was impressive to see how many brilliant ideas emerged in just 24 hours and the hard work that went into bringing them to life. We eagerly await your future innovations!
