A team of five university students from Malaysia took first place at the inaugural ChampionChip eXperience design contest, held during the Selangor AI & Semiconductor Summit (AiSEM). The group designed the electronic “brain” for a barrier-free toll lane capable of making instantaneous, tamper-proof decisions.
The winning project, named LaneX, was created by Team No Jam—composed of students from Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM), Monash University Malaysia, Taylor’s University, and TAR UMT.
How the LaneX Technology Works
Unlike conventional solutions, LaneX operates as an edge controller designed for multi-lane free-flow tolling.
- Custom Processor (RVBL-2): The team built their own custom processor entirely from scratch to power the system.
- Real-Time Decision Making: For every passing vehicle, the system instantly determines whether to charge the driver, take a photo for enforcement, or trigger an alarm for non-compliance.
- Digital Signature Security: Every decision made by the chip is digitally signed via hardware, ensuring the data cannot be forged or manipulated.
- Flawless Testing: During practical testing on AWS cloud-based FPGAs (Field Programmable Gate Arrays), the team’s design passed every organizer test on its very first attempt.
Other Notable Innovations
The competition challenged participants to go beyond theoretical chip design and solve real-world problems. All top-placing teams built their processor architectures from scratch:
- 2nd Place – Underpass Sentinel (Team Maroon 5): An early-warning flood system for urban underpasses. The chip reads water levels in real time, projects how fast the water is rising, and automatically activates pumps, warning beacons, and barrier gates before conditions become dangerous.
- 3rd Place – RackSentinel (Team Corex): A safety controller designed to protect data center server racks from overheating, electrical overloads, and water leaks by initiating emergency power shutdowns when critical faults are detected.
Skill Building & International Cooperation
The ChampionChip eXperience initiative was led by the Advanced Semiconductor Academy of Malaysia (Asem) in partnership with Brazil’s Von Braun Labs and the Embassy of Brazil in Malaysia, under the Brazilian Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Innovation Diplomacy Programme.
With over 900 applicants and 654 active participants from 90 local and international institutions, the program aims to train the next generation of integrated circuit (IC) designers and strengthen the regional high-tech ecosystem.
Based on reporting by The Star.
