KUCHING: A local boy Joseph Chung Ming Chong has been awarded the Tunku Putra-HELP Young Innovator and Researcher Award.
The presentation ceremony was held at Tunku Putra-HELP School, Jalan Kuching-Samarahan Expressway here yesterday.
Joseph received his award from HELP Education Group chief executive officer Datin Chan-Low Kam Yoke.
The 18-year-old and his team designed a prototype device called the ‘Smart e-Saver’ used to detect the presence of young children, especially babies, left unattended in vehicles, based on thermal sensors attached to the engine.
“Basically, Smart e-Saver is a device integrated on the child car seat to prevent the ‘forgotten baby syndrome’, in which some parents accidentally left their children in the car during a hot day for about five to six hours, leading the baby to suffer from stroke, coma or even death.
“There are three sensors on the device namely, pressure sensor, temperature sensor and a motion sensor. These sensors will detect the presence of the baby,” Joseph explained.
“Once it detects the baby, there will be four stages of prevention – the first stage, the child car seat will trigger a soft alarm right after the driver has left the car, which indicates that you have left something behind.
“Five minutes later, if the baby is still present, the device will send a phone alarm or phone notification to the driver or parents.
“If there is no action taken after the 10 minutes have passed, it will trigger the car’s security alarm, which hopefully, will alert passersby.
“And last but not the least, it will present the car’s GPS location, registration number and description to authorities such as the police and fire stations, for them to take action,” he explained to reporters after the ceremony.
This innovation sparked the interest of many in the international community and Joseph was privileged to be invited to attend the 3rd Global Ministerial Conference on Road Safety, hosted by the Swedish government in collaboration with the World Health Organisation (WHO) on Feb 19 and 20 in Stockholm.
Joseph added that he also welcomed any company interested in developing the device to turn the prototype into a real product for commercialisation.
For the record, Joseph has already won numerous accolades in the field of innovation and research at local, state, national and international levels.
In 2017, Joseph was a Sime Darby gold medalist at the national-level Young Innovators Challenge.
In 2018, Joseph and his team walked away as national champion, beating a field of 820 teams comprising 2,200 participants.
