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SINGAPORE, Sept. 18, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — What does impartial residing imply for individuals with disabilities, and the way can know-how assist them obtain it? 52 pupil finalists, chosen competitively from over hundreds of scholars from 10 Singapore’s polytechnics and autonomous universities, tried to seek out that reply by six weeks of immersion, visiting care amenities, talking with beneficiaries, and iterating options with actual end-users.
Minister Edwin Tong at Dell InnovateFest 2026.
Immediately, these options had been put to the take a look at on the fourth annual Dell InnovateFest grand finals at Nationwide Gallery Singapore, hosted by Dell Applied sciences, with Mr Edwin Tong SC, Minister for Regulation and Second Minister for Dwelling Affairs, as Visitor-of-Honour. As well as, Mr Eric Chua, Senior Parliamentary Secretary for the Ministry of Social and Household Growth and the Ministry of Regulation, took on an expanded function this 12 months as Chairman of the Dell InnovateFest Advisory Committee, signalling the deepening of public-private-academic partnership on the coronary heart of the programme.
Organised in partnership with MINDS (previously Motion for the Intellectually Disabled of Singapore) and native disability-focused charity SPD, this 12 months’s hackathon challenged college students to develop AI and cloud-native options that empower Individuals with Mental Incapacity (PWIDs) and Individuals with Disabilities (PWDs) to stay extra independently and inclusively.
This 12 months’s theme – Inclusive and Unbiased Residing – instantly aligns with Singapore’s Enabling Masterplan 2030, which identifies assistive know-how as a core enabler of impartial residing for PWDs and PWIDs. Drawback statements had been developed in shut collaboration with MINDS and SPD, grounding pupil options within the lived realities of beneficiaries quite than hypothetical use circumstances. Scholar groups had been challenged to construct options that assist PWIDs and people with communication difficulties keep every day residing abilities and overcome communication breakdowns, to allow them to have interaction extra independently and confidently in the neighborhood. All through the event course of, groups engaged in common discussions with MINDS and SPD to assemble suggestions and additional refine their options.
The scholars even took their analysis additional by visiting the properties of PWIDs, gaining firsthand perception into the every day challenges their options wanted to deal with.
Over the six-week competitors, pupil groups had been mentored by 30 {industry} consultants from Dell Applied sciences and ecosystem companions together with Microsoft, Certis, NCS, NVIDIA, throughout areas similar to AI engineering, platform engineering, machine studying operations, containerisation and cloud-native structure. Groups had direct entry to Dell Applied sciences cloud-native platform to deploy their functions, in addition to Dell Professional Max with GB10 for safe native AI improvement and testing.
A defining characteristic of the 2026 version was the return of a previous finalist as {industry} mentor. Tay Jeung Hong competed in final 12 months’s hackathon and his technical curiosity and problem-solving mindset caught the eye of Dell Applied sciences which led him to a job on the Dell APJ AI Innovation Hub. He’s working alongside Ryan Sim, a 2023 Dell InnovateFest champion on Bodily AI tasks. This 12 months, Jeung Hong returned to mentor the subsequent cohort. Their story is a full-circle second that displays the programme’s long-term influence on Singapore’s know-how expertise pipeline. Lots of finalists from Dell InnovateFest have additionally secured full-time roles and internships at Dell and its accomplice ecosystem.
Dell InnovateFest is a key enablement pillar of the APJ AI Innovation Hub. Since 2023, the hub has geared up over 11,000 college students and dealing professionals with industry-relevant AI and cloud-native capabilities by its initiatives.
Closing outcomes for Dell InnovateFest 2026 – The workforce from Ngee Ann Polytechnic, with their resolution InSync, a personalised voice and AI assist communication facilitator, and the workforce from Nationwide College of Singapore, with their resolution PotPal, a wholesome consuming weight loss program companion, emerged because the winners of the polytechnic and college tracks respectively, every receiving a grand prize of SGD 10,000.
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For hi-res occasion pictures, please go to the hyperlink right here.
About Dell Applied sciences
Dell Applied sciences (NYSE: DELL) helps organisations and people construct their digital future and rework how they work, stay and play. The corporate supplies prospects with the {industry}’s broadest and most progressive know-how and companies portfolio for the AI period.
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Dell quote:
“Dell InnovateFest is, at its core, a hackathon with a coronary heart. This 12 months’s finalists didn’t simply construct know-how. They immersed themselves in the actual lives of PWIDs, PWDs and developed options with real potential to enhance independence and dignity. What makes this programme actually particular is what occurs past the competitors. Seeing previous members return this 12 months as mentors is the clearest proof that the influence of InnovateFest extends far past a single hackathon. That is what it appears like when know-how turns into a power for good,” stated Andy Sim, Vice President & Managing Director, Dell Applied sciences Singapore
MINDS quote:
“Unbiased and inclusive residing is one thing our shoppers and their households take into consideration each single day. On account of this hackathon, by the visits to our centres and interactions with our shoppers, we hoped the coed groups would depart with a deeper understanding of these lived realities. What we didn’t anticipate was how a lot our personal group would acquire from the expertise – the conversations, the prototypes, the sense that younger persons are investing their abilities in fixing these challenges. We look ahead to seeing how these options will be taken additional,” stated Kelvin Koh, CEO, MINDS
SPD quote:
“Inclusive and accessible options empower individuals with disabilities to stay with higher dignity and independence. We’re heartened by the care the groups have taken to grasp the wants and lived experiences of the individuals they’re designing for. This human-centred method is essential to reworking promising concepts into sensible options that make a significant distinction in on a regular basis life. SPD is privileged to have supported this journey, and we look ahead to seeing these options develop and create lasting influence for individuals with disabilities,” stated Abhimanyau Pal, CEO, SPD
