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Using AI and AR to improve ArcellorMittal's production process at a Hackathon

lab.onebonsai.com

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Re: Using AI and AR to improve ArcellorMittal's production process at a Hackathon

#31

Post by yiyus »

peterbonney wrote: post #10

This is a really cool piece of engineering, but I'm bothered by the idea that the going rate for a huge multinational corporation to get a prototype of a potentially extremely valuable technology is less than 10k of prize money [1], plus a "mini-drone race" and "snacks and food". Maybe it's just me, but I find this type of corporate-sponsored hackathon exploitative and distastefull. We're not talking about an event t…

For you, and I'd say the whole HN audience, it is quite obvious that spending money in an AI approach would be extremely useful. For a steel producer, this is not obvious at all, and consider it a long shot.

I would even bet that the idea of whoever organized the hackaton was not to get free labor, but to prove to someone up there that AI can bring new interesting solutions. In view of the results, I'm quite sure they will be spending more in the future, maybe even starting a new department or a serious research program or something like that in the long term.

Re: Using AI and AR to improve ArcellorMittal's production process at a Hackathon

#32

Post by wenc »

rmorm wrote: post #26
kerberos84 wrote: post #20

How much money will Arcelor earn from this piece of Software? You just implemented it for free!

Hey ! I am one of the AI guy of the team. I agree that if the solution gets implemented on the lines, they will probably make more net money out of it than what was spent for the challenge (which is more than 8.5k€ and some pizzas as said in other comments BTW, the challenge was probably more expensive to organize). However, let's be realistic, they will have to put a lot more money into this before they get a viable…

This. A lot of the other commenters have no idea what it takes to get software productionized in an industrial company.

This is more of a proof-of-concept (and a very impressive one, congratulations), but it will take much more development and resources to get it working on the production line.

Re: Using AI and AR to improve ArcellorMittal's production process at a Hackathon

#33

Post by evarest »

Thanks all for your great comments! For some reason, I cannot answer all your questions as the system blocks me from posting, probably because I did not post the original link here... Therefore, I am going to answer as much as possible in one post :)

I totally understand the feelings of some about "corporate hackathons". While it is valid that companies get probably more from these hackathons than us, I want to stress the following:

- We had the opportunity to work on a challenge with a huge amount of data that I would not otherwise be able to get

- We were able to work with great guys I would not have met otherwise

- We stretched ourselves to see if we could combine AI and AR, which would probably not have happened otherwise

- The implementation of anything built during the weekend would takes months for anyone, even with the code we produced

- This is a learning experience for all parties

The data we used was based on input from a laser scanner. The scanner provides a height map, which would be shown as a colored PNG. We also had point clouds, but only for a few months, so not much use in AI... We used the PNG to generate a bump and normal map to show in AR.

Thanks again and hope that you had fun reading it :)

Re: Using AI and AR to improve ArcellorMittal's production process at a Hackathon

#34

Post by oh_sigh »

peterbonney wrote: post #10

This is a really cool piece of engineering, but I'm bothered by the idea that the going rate for a huge multinational corporation to get a prototype of a potentially extremely valuable technology is less than 10k of prize money [1], plus a "mini-drone race" and "snacks and food". Maybe it's just me, but I find this type of corporate-sponsored hackathon exploitative and distastefull. We're not talking about an event t…

Why are you bothered by it? The 70 teams that joined the hackathon did it out of their own free will, and probably enjoyed it?

Re: Using AI and AR to improve ArcellorMittal's production process at a Hackathon

#35

Post by valesco »

corford wrote: post #29
onebonsai wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for your view. However, it is important to see this event also for what it is. It is a way for Arcelor to think out-of-the-box, and get input from people that are not directly linked to their business. Secondly, it is a way for students to get a glimps of what the corporate projects and challenges are. Additionally, for us, as professionals, it is a way to show, although in a very rough fashion, what is possib…

Really agree with this. Not everything is about money, if it was we wouldn't have squid, postfix, apache, nodejs, python and the millions of other open source software that I and everyone else here relies on daily. Ask the maintainer of GnuPG if he was ever given $10K by a company (prior to the Linux Foundation's Core Infrastructure Initiative grant).

Oh but this was about money. Saving money for a multinational corporation that crushed its rivals in Europe. Nice job.

Re: Using AI and AR to improve ArcellorMittal's production process at a Hackathon

#37

Post by altstar »

MariuszGalus wrote: post #6
ambicapter wrote: post #2

Damn, how many years of experience do you need to be able to come up with workable solutions as fast as this?

6 months, here's why: They random forested height data, everyone random forests these days. It's quick and dirty and yields good accuracy. Not only that, everyone seems to support a built in Random Forest training model, programs from pandas/numpy/scikit to R has it built in. Height data seems the easiest to go by, to short and it has a kink that may cause cracking in the future as the metal oxidizes. What were their…

Yeah right:

We used two convolutional neural networks, one for each side of the weld. Features extracted by these nets are then concatenated, as well as the meta data. Two fully connected layers are then applied on this vector, giving the final prediction. Everything was trained on the raw images resized to 20x150 pixels.

Re: Using AI and AR to improve ArcellorMittal's production process at a Hackathon

#38

Post by rmorm »

dceddia wrote: post #22
peterbonney wrote: post #10

This is a really cool piece of engineering, but I'm bothered by the idea that the going rate for a huge multinational corporation to get a prototype of a potentially extremely valuable technology is less than 10k of prize money [1], plus a "mini-drone race" and "snacks and food". Maybe it's just me, but I find this type of corporate-sponsored hackathon exploitative and distastefull. We're not talking about an event t…

I agree. While I understand the OP's point that it's a valuable experience for the team, a glimpse into solving real problems, it's not a finished product, etc., I still think ArcelorMittal captures the bulk of the value here. They had 70 teams competing. The team in the article had 5 members working for 36 hours, with 3 hours of sleep. Let's say the team members would fetch $150k/year. $75/hr. 5 people, 33 hours. $1…

Just to clarify, there were only ~15 teams, 70 is the number of contestants

Re: Using AI and AR to improve ArcellorMittal's production process at a Hackathon

#39

Post by kerberos84 »

wenc wrote: post #32
rmorm wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hey ! I am one of the AI guy of the team. I agree that if the solution gets implemented on the lines, they will probably make more net money out of it than what was spent for the challenge (which is more than 8.5k€ and some pizzas as said in other comments BTW, the challenge was probably more expensive to organize). However, let's be realistic, they will have to put a lot more money into this before they get a viable…

This. A lot of the other commenters have no idea what it takes to get software productionized in an industrial company. This is more of a proof-of-concept (and a very impressive one, congratulations), but it will take much more development and resources to get it working on the production line.

I think nobody here thinks that this piece of code from weekend will be used on Monday on the band. The hardest part is coming up with a solution and that company got it almost for free. I am pretty sure that this company will even aplly for a patent for this solution! The team should at least get a remuneration if this "proof-of-concept" implemented and will actually be used.

Re: Using AI and AR to improve ArcellorMittal's production process at a Hackathon

#40

Post by evarest »

nartam11 wrote: post #36

Awesome work! I understand its a proof of concept for a hackathon but what's the value of AR here? If AI can indicate a fault with a high success rate how does AR help this situation?

Thanks! Good question, the AI part is clear, it will indicate if there is a big chance of break. The AR will help the operator decide without going to the actual break whether the AI is correct.

The AI only suggests, does not decide on its own. As such, an operator will be able to see the break in full detail (the top and bottom and up close) to better be able to decide whether to continue production, or do a reweld.

Also, sometimes the AI will not be able to provide a good input, as new materials might be welded together and no data is available for them. In that case, again it's up to the operator to actually give the go or no-go.

The AI will inform the operator after about 2 seconds, the operator then still has about 8 seconds to finalize his decision.

The current prototype is not really usable, as it has some big usability issues. We might work further on improving this prototype with the organizer, depending on their interest.

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