A three-person team comprised of Solon Pavlioglou and Ewoud Huiskamp, respectively development and research engineers at Damen R&D, and Priyanka Raikar, a UX designer at Blue Carpet, recently won a Hackathon organised by Allianz Insurance at their office in Rotterdam.
A hackathon is an event, often lasting several days, in which people meet to engage in collaborative computer programming. In the Allianz event, ten teams competed for a top prize of € 3,000.
The challenge was to take the same dataset of anonymised car insurance records; covering details such as claims, dates, car types etc. and to visualise the beauty of the data in such a way that it revealed the information patterns and structures hidden within it. The time limit for the competition was 36 hours, with beds provided for those for whom the endless cups of coffee couldn’t keep awake.
The dream machine
Solon and Ewoud entered the competition confident that they would at least do well. Their experiences with ‘big data’ in Damen’s R&D department proved to be good preparation for this kind of challenge. Analysing big datasets is, as in many other industries, a big part of building and operating sea-going vessels given the wealth of information that their systems produce and its importance for ensuring efficient and safe operations.
For anyone with imagination and an inquisitive mind, Damen R&D is a great place to work. As well as the surprising variety of work it offers, Damen encourages its researchers and analysts to come up with, and work on, their own projects. Through a system known as ‘Genius Hours’, staff regularly get the opportunity to present proposals regarding topics and technologies that they would like to investigate independently. Those that make it through the filter process are allocated budgets that allow the individuals concerned to take time out to work on them. This encourages innovation and taps into the skills and enthusiasm of the R&D staff, to the benefit of all concerned.
Solon has been with Damen for three and a half years, of which the last six months have been with the R&D department. He started at Damen as an assistant project manager in the tugs division after qualifying in Greece with a Bachelor’s degree in naval architecture and marine engineering, and then gaining a Master’s in marine technology at TU Delft. “However, I found myself becoming more involved in business analysis, looking at the processes involved in the decision-making and helping the project managers make more informed decisions,” he says.
Ewoud has been a member of the R&D team for two and a half years, having previously qualified with a BSc in mechanical engineering and an MSc in offshore engineering. He is currently focusing on structures, where amongst other projects he has been part of the team that produced the world’s first class-approved, 3D printed propeller, in bronze. Given the scale of the component, the stresses that it undergoes in operation and the material used, this is regarded throughout the industry as a major breakthrough in the application of 3D printing. It demonstrates its increasing ability to manufacture large scale, highly durable components for the maritime and other industries.