IIT Roorkee Wins RuPay ON-THE-GO Designathon 2022

The global card payment network company- RuPay launched its first-ever designathon this year titled- RuPay ON-THE-GO Designathon 2022. The competition was open to college students across campuses in India. With the opportunity to collaborate with RuPay and other exciting prizes up for grabs, the competition got 16,913 registration. My name is Sreehari.S, a student at IIT Roorkee, and I was super excited to be a part of this brilliant challenge. It still feels surreal to have won the national winner title and I will never forget this experience. 

Format Of RuPay ON-THE-GO Designathon 2022

RuPay ON-THE-GO Designathon was more than just a competition. It was a chance to learn and explore new things, connect with the immense talent across the nation, interact with industry experts, and much more. The flow of the competition was as follows:

• Form Factor & Design Submission
• National Finale

The three months that I spent on this competition were extremely fun and memorable. Not to say that there wasn’t any pressure, but the team at RuPay managed everything extremely well, kept us motivated, and ensured that everyone got a chance to showcase their talents. In each round, they encouraged us to refine and improve our designs. Not just this, the support offered by the team at Unstop, the timely notifications, 24/7 query clarification, and more was a blessing. In short, it was a wonderful experience!

Check this out: Challenge Yourself With These B-school Competitions

RuPay ON-THE-GO Designathon 2022: Winning Strategy

This was a completely new experience for me but the strategy I had in place helped me move toward my goal:

• The foundation of my strategy was to follow a user-centric design approach. Everything I did was in cohesion with this thought process. 
• After establishing my general approach, I moved on to conduct primary research. For this, I reviewed all the devices, studied the user groups, the scope of the application, and more.

It took me around three to five days to narrow down the final design concept from a wide range of possible solutions. I did face a few challenges with regard to the technical information, but the expert session with team RuPay helped me get clarification on most of my concerns. It also immensely helped me in refining the design for my final submission.

The Experience & Lessons Learned

This was my first time working on a payment gadget device design. I did not know anything about the technology and design constraints that we had to consider for this project, so the knowledge I gathered was something new. After this competition, I am even more confident in my skills and knowledge pool and am eager to use these learnings and design methodologies in any future project that I will be a part of. The whole process of the competition was smooth, and we were given proper notifications on time regarding the updates. The judgment was also excellent and it was evident that the panel appreciated the result of hard work.

Also read: Boosting Career Opportunities For Engineers Through E-School Competitions

The Surprising Result

One of the most surprising and exciting moments throughout this journey was how I got to know about the result. I was not expecting the result that particular day and was receiving a lot of praise and appreciation for my solution at RuPay ON-THE-GO Designathon 2022. But at the time I still wasn't aware that the results were out. It was only after a friend called to inform me did I check the portal out and there it was- my name against the national winner title. The feeling that overcame me is indescribable and I will carry it with me for a long time to come. This opportunity was beyond amazing, and I commend as well as encourage Unstop and RuPay for organizing such competitions. #BeUnstoppable

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