Bhanuka Gamage

Name: Bhanuka Gamage
Nationality: Sri Lankan
Current Role: Senior R&D Machine Learning Engineer at Ilume (Australia)

Please tell us about your role in your current organisation.

Map72

Part-time Contract Software Developer working on a real world Computer Vision and Machine Learning project with the a vision of improving Artificial Intelligence (AI) in Malaysia.

Monash University

Writing a thesis for Honours in Computer Vision supervised by Dr.Lim Chern Hong

Writing a journal article based on the Final Year Project (FYP) undertaken on Clickbait detection, with my teammates supervised by Associate Prof Wong Kok Sheik, Dr.Lim Chern Hong.

PASS leader for FIT2099 (Object Oriented Design)

How has your studies at Monash University Malaysia helped to prepare you for the working world?

As a Sri Lankan, it was critical for me as it paved the path to a wider range of international opportunities. Monash Computer Science students are well respected in the industry as they have a good reputation and foundation in computer science principles.

While at Monash, what type of opportunities did you participate in? (E.g. student exchange, clubs and societies, field trips, conferences, competitions, etc.)

My team and I (3 member) became one of the finalist in APICTA competition in 2019 under the Tertiary Education category, supervised by Dr.Fermi Pasha.

Participated in the inaugural Monash Hackathon 2019, where my team and I built a unit reviewing system. Currently, this hackathon idea is being developed to be integrated into the Faculty of IT, Monash University, Malaysia with the help of Prof.Rajendran Parthiban, A/Prof. Anuja Dharmaratne and Dr.Lim Wern Han.

Represented Monash at the Hack & Roll 2020, Hackathon in NUS, Singapore.

Member of the Monash Entrepreneurs Club

While at Monash, did you go for any internships or work placements? If so, where? And did the experience help you in terms of career preparation?

Yes, as part of the FIT3199, I did an internship at Map72. Through this internship, my exposure towards handling and solving real world problems widened. It thus helped me improve my understanding on how to take on and tackle such real world problem scenarios and paved the way for an opportunity to work part time during my honours year.

What did you like most about your student life at Monash? 

The very smart and hardworking friends that challenged me to perform better.

Networking with people from different backgrounds, cultures and countries.

What is your biggest career goal? What’s the difference you’d like to make?

Being an Entrepreneur, with a vision of “Starting my own company, selling the company and buying more companies.”, is my biggest career goal. Working towards the betterment of society and its surroundings, with a focus on global issues such as hunger, climate change and sustainability and how to solve them.