JOHOR BAHRU, Apr 30 – Team Teh Tarik, comprising undergraduate students from the Bachelor of Electronic Engineering programme, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM), and Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM), and supervised by their project advisor, Ir. Ts. Dr. Suhaila Isaak from the Faculty of Electrical Engineering (FKE), UTM, was awarded the Silver Award in Category C (Device Design and Development) at the 2026 Micron MIMORY Awards, held at the National Tsing Hua University (NTHU), Hsinchu, Taiwan.

The team members include Chan Jia Ming, Joshua Looi Kin-U and Loo Ix Shen from UTM, as well as Lee Yen Fei from USM.

The 2026 Micron MIMORY Awards attracted nearly 300 local and international submissions, including Taiwan, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, Vietnam and Indonesia, underscoring its highly competitive and prestigious nature. The competition was structured into four categories: Category A: Advanced Process Technology Development, Category B: Next-Generation Semiconductor Applied Materials, Category C: Device Design and Development and Category D: Semiconductor Production and Manufacturing.

Each category featured five finalist teams, representing some of the top student teams in Asia. Team Teh Tarik’s selection as a finalist reflects their strong technical capability and innovative mindset.

Team Teh Tarik’s journey began with identifying a key inefficiency in modern memory systems, particularly in Dynamic Random Access Memory (DRAM). Conventional refresh mechanisms in DDR5 architectures operate at conservative time intervals, often resulting in unnecessary energy consumption and reduced system performance.

To address this challenge, the team developed a Multivariate Adaptive Refresh Controller, a solution that dynamically adjusts memory refresh intervals based on real-time system conditions. By incorporating a low-overhead machine learning-based “Teacher–Student” model, the system optimises performance while maintaining data integrity.

Simulation results demonstrated significant improvements in both energy efficiency and system performance, highlighting the team’s ability to translate theoretical knowledge into practical engineering solutions.

The competition journey involved several stages, including online registration, proposal submission, and a competitive selection process. Team Teh Tarik successfully advanced to the Final Round held on 30 April 2026 at NTHU, Taiwan.

During the final round, each team delivered a technical presentation followed by a question-and-answer session with a panel of judges comprising industry experts and academic professionals. Each team was given 20 minutes for presentation and 10 minutes for evaluation, with judging based on innovation, technical depth, feasibility, and clarity of delivery.

Team Teh Tarik impressed the judges with their strong technical foundation, structured methodology, and practical implementation, ultimately securing the Silver Award in Category C.

This achievement reflects UTM’s commitment to producing graduates with strong technical expertise and innovative thinking, capable of competing on an international platform.

It also highlights the importance of bridging academic knowledge with real-world industry challenges. Beyond the competition, the experience provided valuable exposure to global industry practices, networking opportunities with experts, and deeper insights into the evolving semiconductor landscape.

The success of Team Teh Tarik is expected to pave the way for future collaboration between UTM and global industry leaders such as Micron. It also serves as an inspiration for students to actively engage in innovation-driven research and participate in international competitions. This achievement has also gained international recognition, with the team’s success being featured in Taiwan media, including Minews (https://www.minews.com.tw/2026/05/19176/).