Farewell ABB – my internship is over

Krakow is a culturally rich city, and a nice place to live. I’ll definitely be back!

In what felt like a blink of an eye since my last post, my internship at ABB through 'Blind Applying' has just come to an end.

The time spent at the Corporate Research Center in Krakow allowed me to have a glimpse of all the work behind innovation at ABB, meet great people, and have my first experience of full-time work.

The Project
I previously wrote about the project I was working on – developing a proof-of-concept for a “new” type of predictive controller. Before I left, I managed to have a working version of the software for the controller. Unfortunately, there was not enough time to proceed with testing it in real situations. The work I developed showed that the usage of parallel processing is likely to bring an improvement for this type of controller but further testing will be necessary. I am happy with the outcome!

Final Weeks
My final week was particularly interesting. Besides making the final touches to my project, I got to know more about its possible applications. It turns out that the type of controller I was developing is very similar to the ones used in ABB’s ENVILINE products. The ENVILINE consists of a range of devices aimed at reducing power consumption in rail transport by recovering some of the energy when trains are braking. It was nice to see that my work is fairly close to real applications.

Krakow
It is a very culturally rich city, full of people from everywhere and overall a nice place to live. I definitely enjoyed my time here and I’ll certainly be coming back in the future!

What’s next?
After this short experience, now it’s time for me to start my career (or has it started already?). I am looking forward to working in engineering either in the power/energy or transport industries in the near future. I have been sending out applications for quite some time, and have attended interviews and I’ll keep doing so until I find a nice fit.

I am back home in Lisbon now enjoying the sunny warm weather and exploring another interest I have had for some time now: working part-time in a tech startup, mainly in operations and business development. I am excited to see what this three-month break from pure engineering will bring.

Related content:
My ABB internship – phase two of developing a new type of predictive controller
My ABB internship in Krakow is on!

 

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About the author

Gonçalo Guerreiro

I am currently working as an intern at the ABB Corporate Research Center (CRC) in Krakow. I started studying Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Lisbon, my hometown, and have just recently finished my KIC InnoEnergy Master Degree in Energy Technologies at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology. I am also a member of the Board of European Students of Technology. While searching for my first job/internship, I joined the “Blind Applying Campaign” which ultimately brought me to ABB for three months. I am looking forward to having a taste of what corporate research is like, as well as developing my skills with this experience.
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