Over 5,500 students participate in Skill Palaver hackathon at KL University

Vijayawada: The final slot (Slot 2) of the third phase of "Skill Palaver", a project-based hackathon, was conducted from February 28 to March 1, 2026, at KL Deemed to be University.According to organisers, 5,546 students from disciplines including Computer Science and Engineering, AI and Data Science, CS and IT, Electronics and Communication Engineering, Electrical and Electronics Engineering, IoT, Civil, Mechanical, BCA, and MCA took part in the event. The hackathon covered domains such as Artificial Intelligence, Data Analytics, Cloud Computing, Cybersecurity, IoT, Blockchain, 5G Technology, VLSI, Embedded Systems, Software Engineering, Structural Engineering, and Game Design.The AI and ML Challenge recorded the highest participation, with 852 students. Cybersecurity and Ethical Hacking had 659 participants, while the GEN-AI Hack saw 606 students competing. Other events included the Cloud Challenge, Data-Driven Emotion Hack, NLP Innovators Hack, and IoT Fusion Hackathon.Industry representatives from companies such as Ford, IBM, Cisco, Flipkart, Tata Elxsi, KPIT Technologies, and Synopsys were involved in mentoring and evaluation during different stages of the programme.University officials stated that around 70% of the participating students demonstrated industry readiness in emerging technologies, while about 60% showed AI-related competency, based on expert feedback.