Samsung India’s flagship CSR program Samsung Innovation Campus concluded the Coding & Programming, AI and IoT courses for its first batch of 88 students in Bhubaneswar, reiterating Samsung’s commitment to being a strong partner of India and working alongside the Government in its mission to empower the country’s youth and #PoweringDigitalIndia.

The students, who were mentored and trained at Central Tool Room & Training Center, Bhubaneswar, were presented with certificates at a ceremony held on Thursday.

ESSCI, which is a National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC) approved entity, is executing the program through its nationwide network of approved training and education partners.

Student teams from the Coding & Programming course participated in the 3-day Hackathon in which they developed codes based on problem statements given to them.

The problem statements included topics such as developing a chatbot for e-governance support, an e-commerce website for handicrafts and artisan-based industries, a machine learning model to predict housing prices, a loan approval system, a plant leaf disease detection system using image classification, a home automation module and a social media platform for senior citizens. The teams presented their prototypes to a jury from Samsung R&D Institute, Noida and Central Tool Room & Training Center, Bhubaneswar.

“Our global citizenship initiative, Samsung Innovation Campus, is in alignment with India’s development agenda. Through this initiative, we want to empower the youth and create opportunities for them in future tech domains, further boosting India’s growth story and strengthening our commitment to Powering Digital India,” said Mr. Partha Ghosh, Head, CSR and Communications, Samsung Southwest Asia.

Samsung India launched its Samsung Innovation Campus program at eight campuses across the country with the aim of upskilling 3,000 less-privileged youth in future tech domains such as AI, IoT, Big Data and Coding & Programming and helping them get relevant job placements.

Samsung Innovation Campus aims to upskill youth aged 18-25 years in future technologies and enhance their employability. These are key technology skills for the Fourth Industrial Revolution.

During the course of the program, participants receive instructor-led classroom training through approved training and education partners of ESSCI across the country.

Youth enrolled in the program are undergoing classroom training and complete their hands-on capstone project work in their selected technology areas from among Artificial Intelligence, Internet of Things, Big Data and Coding & Programming. They will also be imparted soft skills training to enhance their employability and provided job placements in relevant organizations. 

Those opting for the AI course will undergo 270 hours of theory training and complete 80 hours of project work while those doing the IoT or the Big Data course will undergo 160 hours of training and complete 80 hours of project work. Participants opting for the Coding & Programming course will do 80 hours of training and be part of a Hackathon.

At an education and innovation roadshow organized by Samsung India in Bhubaneswar young school and college students came forward and identified problems that people and society are facing in the state and the country, pledging to Solve for Tomorrow.

Students in Bhubaneswar said they want to solve real-world problems such as job security for daily wage laborers, mental wellness for school students, safe disposal of sanitary napkins, livelihood for local fishermen around Chilka Lake, lack of plastic reuse, crop damage due to rodents, reusing agricultural waste, among others. They said they require a platform such as Samsung’s Solve for Tomorrow education and innovation competition that can guide and support them in turning their ideas into action and help transform people’s lives.

The event, which was organized to talk about Samsung’s global CSR program Solve for Tomorrow, was attended by over 400 students in Bhubaneswar alongside a young innovator from the city – Pritam Dhalla, co-founder at Larkai Healthcare that has developed a medical device that capture data from the heart in 30 seconds. His company provides screening to rural patients.

The innovator, who currently runs a successful social enterprise, spoke to the students about his experiences of success and failure and his vision to transform communities around him.

The inaugural edition of Solve for Tomorrow is inviting applications from youth in India aged 16-22 years in the areas of Education, Environment, Healthcare and Agriculture. Youth can send in their ideas to participate in the program till 5 pm on July 31, 2022.

Application website: http://www.samsung.com/in/solvefortomorrow

So far, over 7,000 teams from across the country have registered for the innovation competition in which three national winners will get mega support of up to INR 1 crore and mentoring support for six months to take their ideas to the next level under the expert guidance of IIT Delhi.