George Brown College students Tanvir Singh Ahuja and Melric Rego have won Global Goals Jam 2022, a virtual event allowing individuals to showcase their innovation and skills by pitching a sustainable way to manage “Dark Data.”
On the team of four, Ahuja, who is currently enrolled in the Applied AI Solutions Development program, and Rego, a current student of Building Information Modelling program, were accompanied by a student from Centennial College and a student from Ireland.
Speaking to their individual experiences at the competition, Ahuja mentioned that this is his second time participating in the competition. Last time, he bagged third place. For Rego who has just completed his first semester, it was a completely new experience.
With a total of nine teams competing, participants were challenged to provide sustainable solutions in various domains. The GBC team decided to target Dark Data: the data a company collects but fails to use in any insightful manner. Staying on computers forever unused, this information consumes heaps of energy.
On asking how the team chose their topic, Rego revealed unsustainable practices that govern the management of dark data in the contemporary world. “No one addresses dark data because everyone says they’re storing their data on Cloud, because they think that’s the most sustainable way possible. Which in fact, is not.” Therefore, their main goal in the competition was to cater to customer groups who could benefit most from their services.
The virtual event allowed participants to experiment with various ideas according to Ahuja:, “On the first day, we had one idea. And the next day, we had another idea. And on the final day, we had to pivot and come to this final solution through the help of our mentors, from different expertise, from startGBC, as well. So, I believe dark data came after a lot of research and a lot of just figuring out how we can target our topic, and how we can build on top of it.”
Ahuja and Rego noted that networking was a key benefit of the competition. Although both of them are current GBC students, the pair met each other through the event itself. The experience of working together with professionals helped them ace their project and establish crucial connections. Furthermore, the contest introduced them to many great-minded individuals, peers, and mentors. As Rego pointed out, even a month after the Global Goals Jam, they are still interacting with new people solely because of the competition.
High-spirited, both are eager about their plans for the future. While Ahuja aims to be a businessman, Rego is happy to be learning more about his field and will continue to do so. As their goals are discrepant from each other, both of them have decided to not experiment further with the project yet.
However, the future can be full of surprises.
