13 LSBU projects registered for the 2020 Mayor of London’s Entrepreneurs Competition
Each entrant is in with a chance of winning one of four £20,000 prizesThirteen projects from London South Bank University were registered for the 2020 Mayor of London’s Entrepreneurs Competition, one of the largest registrations of all the London universities.
Sadiq Khan has allocated four prizes of £20,000 for each of the following categories: Environment, Smart Cities, Creative Industries and Health. Winners will be announced after a final presentation in Autumn 2020.
Amongst the LSBU entrants is Elisa Puccinelli and her project Flux.on, which aims to make bus travel safer. Elisa has layered her proposal so different levels can be adopted by Transport for London and bus manufacturers at different times.
Initially, bus information panels would be updated, and infrared cameras could give a real-time indication of passenger temperatures and help with COVID-19 track & trace.
In the mid-term a lighting system on the stairs would warn travellers to “hold on very tightly please”. Smart pressure sensors would also be fitted to all seats to give feedback occupancy (seated passengers) and indicate to the lower deck where empty seats are located on the top deck.
In the long term, it is proposed that the position of the staircase is moved to allow designated floor space for both wheelchairs and baby buggies.
At the moment buggies and wheelchair users share the same space which can lead to problems if the bus is full.
The School of Engineering at LSBU is also home to the Nathu Puri Institute for Engineering and Enterprise, which focuses on embedding innovation and entrepreneurship into engineering education and industrial practice.
Prof. Simon Philbin, Director of the Institute, commented: “It is great to see LSBU registering 13 projects for the 2020 Mayor of London’s Entrepreneurs Prize and Elisa’s Flux.on project is an excellent example of technological innovation addressing the current COVID-19 crisis while also having longer term application to help improve bus operations in London”.
UPDATE
We are pleased to announce that Elisa Puccinelli's project has made it into the semi-final with only 119 other entrants of the hundreds that entered. We are also very happy to announce that 2 other LSBU students have also made this year’s semi-finals.
The semi-finalists will now submit a 2 minute video pitch to be judged by our expert panels and the finalists. This is the second year we have held semi-finals and we have 26 institutions represented in our 120 semi-finalists.
Here are the LSBU semi-finalists:
Name of lead applicant(s) | Course of study | Business name |
|---|---|---|
Luke Lee Alderson Ryan Allinson Joshua Martin Danny Tony Alan Walker | BEng (Hons) Electrical and Electronic Engineering Apprenticeship | TfL: Carbon Donations |
Jovan Cvijanovic Shadman Chakma Montu; Nahin Islam Hicham Koultouma | BEng (Hons) Chemical Engineering | Quick Compost |
Elisa Guimaraes Puccinelli Rebelo | BSc (Hons) Engineering Product Design | Flux.on |