Joy Mukherjee, a third-year dual degree student in Physics and Computer Science at BITS Pilani, Pilani campus who is a member of satellite team, which is currently building a Nanosatellite with support from ISRO is selected as the winner of Hackathon Easy Ride - Bonjour India on the theme of smart and sustainable mobility, a flagship programme by the French Embassy, in collaboration with Indian and French transportation industries. The program was graced by H.E Mr. Alexandre Ziegler, Ambassador of France to India, along with the Lieutenant Governor of Pondicherry, Ms. Kiran Bedi and Chief Secretary Mr. Ashwani Kumar. The competition took place in Veltech University, Chennai on January, 2018 and saw the participation of about 40 selected student teams from all over the country. Ten Jury Members coming from leading industrial companies such as Faurecia, Simpson & Co. Ltd, WABCO India Ltd., Mahindra World City, Mahindra Electric Mobility Ltd., Nissan Ashok Leyland Power Train Ltd., Renault and Ausländer International evaluated the projects and awarded the three most innovative projects for each stream of competition.

Joy Mukherjee is awarded the first prize with incubation support and a prize money of Rs. 30,000 for his work on smart and connected urban transportation systems. He has also won the Best Paper award in Spacecraft Systems and Mechanisms Division, at the “National Conference On Small Satellites Technology and Applications (NCSSTA 2017).” The conference took place in Chennai during December 2017 to address the miniaturization technologies, small satellites missions and involvement of different sectors towards accessibility of space. There were invited talks and papers in the conference and awards and publication prospects were accorded to best papers in each category during the event.