A talented team of students from Royal Holloway has won a UK industry competition to build next-generation technology solutions that tackle real-world business challenges.

Team Shark, comprising five students from the Department of Computer Science, were competing with over 70 students from top universities in the UK and Ireland to win the  Cisco University Challenge for 2017. The intensive two-day hackathon took place from 26-27 October and was judged by industry experts against a thorough set of professional and technical criteria.

Left to right: Megan Goh, Hugh Wells, Dulcie Jackson, Awen Saunders, Shaurya Puri

Balancing experience and complementary skills, Team Shark members were Awen Saunders as project manager; Dulcie Jackson, Hugh Wells and Shaurya Puri as software engineers; and Megan Goh as business analyst. Their winning project was TrainShark, a platform for combating crowding on trains through real time congestion monitoring. Designed to use the WiFi on trains to estimate the number of passengers in a carriage and inform customers of the best carriage to board, it works by leveraging Cisco Meraki access points, which provide real-time scanning data of nearby devices. Watch their short video

Professor Paul Hogg, Vice Principal and Dean of Science and Enterprise at Royal Holloway said,

"Our Royal Holloway team demonstrated enthusiasm, commitment and excellent team work to win the Cisco university challenge and achieve an ingenious solution to relieve rush hour congestion. Many congratulations to all who took part."

The Cisco University Challenge is an annual event that invites undergraduates to battle their wits against the best universities across the United Kingdom and Ireland. Royal Holloway’s Department of Computer Science was well represented this year with a second team also competing, comprising of Zack Clark-Kington, Alex Clarke, Andrew Nicolalde, Chris Melville, and James Kempster.

Find out about study opportunities in the Department of Computer Science here.