3rd Perodua Eco-Challenge Event Updates

The Perodua Eco-Challenge 2011 continues its quest to seek out new talents among the country’s pool of undergraduates.  The final is just around the corner whereat they will pit their capabilities at the final ‘race’ day, scheduled to be held at the Melaka International Motorsports Circuit (MIMC), Melaka on 25 June. The 3rd instalment of Perodua’s Corporate Responsibility initiative kicked in early this year during which the 13 participating institutions of higher learning were each given an engine and a transmission system. 
The main objective of the Perodua Eco-Challenge 2011 is to provide a training ground for undergraduates to challenge their engineering capabilities and to spur the essence of innovation and creativity among local students.
Perodua’s Managing Director, Datuk Aminar Rashid Salleh said, “As a concerned corporate citizen, we shall continue to play our role to provide opportunities for our able young adults. Through this Eco-Challenge competition, the students’ innate capabilities, spirit  of innovation and creativity can be developed, very much in line with the aims of the 10th Malaysia Plan.” 
Since the 2011 kick-off, Perodua led by Encik Alias Abu Hassan, the project chairman together with Encik Hasrol Hashim, the R&D technical advisor and Perodua colleagues has been visiting the teams, to co-ordinate with the students and their team leaders.  
“Through these visits, Perodua will be able to monitor and counsel the teams besides checking on their progress and also any problems encountered along the way”, Aminar added. The visits saw the institutions presenting their progress and the Perodua team was able to check on whether the teams are complying with the rules and safety regulations. Additional enquiries on technicalities were assisted by the Perodua R&D team while non-technical matters were handled by Perodua’s Corporate Communications’ committee members.
Aminar stressed, “We take into account their participation, presentation, commitment, enthusiasm and teamwork. This ensures that they will come up with exciting, new developments and technology on the engine. We hope to see many new ideas materialising. This will showcase our engineering students’ capabilities.
The winning team whose vehicle can go the furthest on ½ litre of Petronas Primax 95 will take home the grand prize of RM20,000 and those with the best engineering feat will receive RM10,000 followed by the best design and participation being awarded RM5,000.
New participants for this year’s challenge include Politeknik Port Dickson, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia and Universiti Teknikal Malaysia Melaka. 
The other institutions are Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, Universiti Kuala Lumpur Malaysia Spanish Institute, Politeknik Sultan Azlan Shah, Universiti Malaysia Pahang, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Universiti Teknologi MARA, Universiti Teknologi Petronas, Universiti Tenaga Nasional, Universiti Industri Selangor and Politeknik Ungku Omar.