Meet SCT’s experts - Muzzammil Mia, Senior Software Engineer

Behind every product, every innovation, is a dedicated team of software engineers that make it happen. In this edition of our meet the experts blog series, we’re highlighting Muzzammil Mia, whose technical expertise and drive to “know more” helps us keep our development and innovation on track. 

Can you share with me a bit about your background and what led you to join Smart Component Technologies? 

It’s when I first got my hands on a Raspberry Pi that I got interested in developing tech. With the development of things like smartphones, it was more about gaining an understanding of what’s going on – hardware, firmware, software – that really got me interested in engineering. . What really cemented me into wanting to work in firmware in particular was when I was developing projects from collision detection algorithms at the University of Bristol. Then, I started to work at a company where I developed architectures and firmware for products that were used in reliability and system monitoring for medical devices. So that’s where the monitoring side of things came into place for me. All of that led me to where I am now at SCT – working in remote condition monitoring for the rail and mining industries. 

How long have you been with SCT? 

I’ve been with SCT for two and a half years now, and throughout that time, I've worked on various kinds of pilot projects, both technical and non-technical, which is kind of unique. I’ve worked on the SWiX device, the platform sensor and several other interesting projects.

Have you had a favourite project you’ve worked on? 

A lot of the projects are fun. In particular, one project that comes to mind was working on the clamp force sensor. We worked with a company out in Australia to do a deployment that measures multiple clamp forces on different mining equipment. 

Another that stands out is working with the SWiX product. That's something that, when I joined, was already commercially available to customers. Looking at the kind of changes and developments from the commercial application of the SWiX and seeing real life data has been really interesting. 

What do you think makes SCT unique? What do you think sets it apart from other companies?

The biggest thing is customer focus. Our team is continually supporting customers and really makes the effort to understand their needs. Another thing that separates us is our working implementations and optimising performance. We've got devices out in the field at the moment, and we're always continuously trying to work out, how we can better optimise operations. We ensure that the customer really receives a good and robust solution that’s continuously being improved.

What does a typical day look like for you? 

It really tends to vary based on a number of factors for example; where we are in a project, or if we are running commercial deployment, or if we’re doing research and development. Some days I might be developing new features. Other days I might be preparing for a technical meeting, or for an internal discussion about improvements and enhancements for products. So, it really does vary. But typically, what I do within my role is feature development, testing and making sure things are going smoothly – and whether we can improve anything. 

Where do you see the biggest opportunities for innovation in predicting and preventing asset failures? 

Fault failure analysis is the biggest aspect that I see, in terms of innovations. It’s necessary for predicting asset failure and asset visibility. This is all so maintenance engineers can better understand what's going on. Essentially, it’s understanding and predicting exactly what could become failures; could it be a cracked crossing? Could it be voiding? I think really having better asset visibility prevents asset failures, and it’s what our customers are looking for as well.

If we were to have this conversation in a year’s time, how do you think things will have changed? 

I think we'll probably have more products and an even better understanding of what customers need, what the new issues they’d like to solve are. At the moment, we’re supporting our customers, we're learning what's more useful to them, and what we're hoping to do is provide more resilient and robust and resilient fault detection. We're also looking into how we can help the track maintenance engineers further detect failures and find out failure modes in a more decisive and enhanced way. 

In a year’s time, I expect we’ll have a better understanding and ability to find the root cause of more issues based on the data we collect. For example, if you have a device, you’ll have a variation measurement. And that variation measurement could be because the material underneath the bearer is loose. Or it could be because in hot countries, the railways expand. Within the next year I expect us to be able to better identify the root cause and help our customers in that way. 

What’s something people might be surprised to learn about you?

I'm getting a motorcycle licence! I’m planning on doing a little bit more motorcycling to start visiting other places. 

What’s a hobby or interest you have outside of work?

I like cycling a lot. Within Cambridgeshire, there's a lot of nice places to visit. You've got the castles, the National Trusts around Cambridge, and then you've got places like Grafton water reserve, which are all excellent places for cycling. That's what I like to do on the weekends, just go visit somewhere on my bike for an adventure and see more of Cambridge.

Are there any places in Cambridge you’d recommend to a visitor?

Definitely visit the Fitzwilliam Museum, and you have to visit some of the university buildings. They're very, very nice. The town centre is very charming as we've got a lot of historic places and areas. I’d also recommend seeing the botanical gardens.

Thank you, Muzzammil, for your time!