The Safety First! 2026 transportation safety competition, organized for the fourth consecutive year by the Department of Automotive Technologies at the Budapest University of Technology and Economics (BME) and its Safety and Security Research Group, has successfully concluded. At this year’s final round, student teams presented the research and development results they had been working on throughout the semester, offering innovative responses to real-world vehicle safety challenges.

Since its launch, the goal of the Safety First! competition has been to provide students with an opportunity to work on real engineering problems while developing their professional skills with both academic and industrial support. Throughout the multi-stage competition, participants are expected not only to develop technically sound concepts, but also to demonstrate their applicability and present their results in a professional manner.

In the final round, projects were evaluated by an expert jury based on five key criteria: the quality of the abstract, the technical standard of the documentation, the level of innovation, project maturity, and the quality of the oral presentation.

Innovative Solutions for the Future of Vehicle Safety

This year’s competition once again reflected the technological diversity of today’s automotive industry, covering topics ranging from vehicle dynamics and artificial intelligence to driver monitoring systems and the verification of safety-critical functions.

🥇 1st Place – Squadron

Reinforcement Learning Based Oversteer Control Under Dynamically Changing Adhesion

The winning team introduced a hybrid Model Predictive Control (MPC) and Reinforcement Learning-based vehicle stability solution capable of adaptive intervention under rapidly changing road adhesion conditions. The system supports safe vehicle control through real-time decision-making and demonstrates promising applicability in advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) and fleet-level safety applications.

🥈 2nd Place – NOVA

Neural Optimization for Verified Automotive Safety

The second-place project addressed a particularly timely challenge: how to reconcile the performance of neural networks with the strict verification requirements of automotive safety-critical systems. The team presented an innovative concept combining the trainability of AI-based vehicle functions with validation and certification considerations.

🥉 3rd Place – OrbitDMS

Modelling Multi-Sensor Fusion for Driver Monitoring System for Takeover Readiness

The third-place team focused on one of the key challenges of partially automated driving: how to reliably determine whether a driver is ready to take back control of the vehicle. Their multi-sensor fusion approach could contribute to safer transitions between automated and manual driving.

Real Industry Perspective, Practical Experience

The competition once again demonstrated that students are capable of addressing today’s automotive challenges at a remarkably high professional level. The presented projects stood out not only for their technical depth and practical relevance, but also for the mature, systems-level engineering mindset demonstrated by the participants.

“One of the greatest strengths of the Safety First! competition is that it gives students the opportunity to challenge themselves in an environment that closely resembles real industrial development processes. Beyond technical content, problem definition, high-quality documentation, and professional presentation skills are equally important,” highlighted Tamás Kazár, chief organizer of the competition and PhD researcher of the Safety and Security Research Group at the BME Department of Automotive Technologies.

Acknowledgements to Our Supporters and Jury Members

This year’s competition was once again supported by our industrial partner, Bosch, whose expert involvement provided students with direct insight into industrial expectations and development perspectives.

We would also like to express our sincere appreciation to the members of the professional jury for their valuable feedback and dedicated work:

• Réka Jenei (Bosch)
• Tamás Kazár (BME KJK, Safety and Security Research Group)
• Árpád Török (BME KJK, Head of the Safety and Security Research Group)

We warmly congratulate all participants for their hard work and dedication, and especially the finalist teams for their outstanding achievements.

Over the past four years, the Safety First! competition has evolved into a unique professional platform where students not only compete, but also develop genuine engineering thinking, presentation skills, and an industry-oriented mindset. We are already looking forward to the innovative ideas and new challenges of next year’s competition.