The ONIA Winter Warmup Challenge 2025 successfully concluded on December 12, bringing together over 140 students passionate about artificial intelligence from across the country. The event was organized with the support of the Romanian Computer Science Teachers' Union (UPIR) and the ONIA Team, in partnership with Politehnica University of Bucharest and the University of Bucharest, and was hosted on the MLCompete platform, developed by the ONIA technical team.
About the Competition
During the four-hour contest, participants tackled various challenges in artificial intelligence, algorithmic thinking, and data analysis, in a format focused on finding correct and efficient solutions.
The proposed problems offered practical experience, close to real-world situations, such as automatic error detection in images, recognition of important elements in photographs, or making predictions based on datasets, helping participants understand how artificial intelligence is applied concretely, beyond theory.
The competitors' performance was complemented by a final presentation stage for the top 10 finalists, designed to confirm the authenticity of their work and reasoning approach.
Competition Problems
Glitch Hunter (Difficulty: HARD)
Author: Robert Colca
A computer vision challenge where participants had to detect and segment visual glitches from corrupted images. The task consisted of generating binary masks that highlight areas with noise, inverted colors, or foreign color blocks, evaluated using the IoU (Intersection over Union) metric.
Word Magic (Difficulty: HARD)
Author: Mihai Nan
An AI-generated image classification and analysis problem, where contestants had the mission to identify the keywords that were used to generate each image. From 20 candidate words, participants had to select the 5 most relevant ones, prioritizing the 3 correct words that generated the image.
National Rabbit Exhibition (Difficulty: MEDIUM)
Author: Mihai Nan
A problem structured in 3 subtasks that combined data analysis, clustering, and regression. Participants worked with a dataset about exhibition rabbits, with tasks ranging from simple data queries, to grouping animals into breeds without prior information (clustering evaluated through ARI) and prediction of judging scores (evaluated through MSE).
Meet the Winners
Congratulations to the ONIA Winter Warmup Challenge 2025 winners!
Daniel Ion is a student at UNSTPB, Faculty of Automation and Computer Science. His interest in artificial intelligence stems from gaming and has transformed into a passion for building algorithms that learn, make decisions, and adapt. He is drawn to AI applications with real impact, as well as the creative side of technology.
Ștefan-Asandei Alexandru is a 12th grade student at Colegiul Național Iași and an international AI olympiad competitor. Passionate about AI research and academic excellence, he aims to build his future in this field, where performance and innovation meet.
Rareș Anghel is an 11th grade student at the National Computer Science College "Tudor Vianu" in Bucharest, passionate about artificial intelligence and programming. He created the OCR230 application for NGOs and aims to develop technology solutions with social impact.
Mihnea-Teodor Stoica is a student at the International Computer Science High School in Bucharest, passionate about programming, artificial intelligence, and developing tools for programmers. Curious and depth-oriented, Mihnea is actively involved in technical projects and competitions, where he combines rigor with the desire to build useful solutions.
Partners and Supporters
The technical infrastructure was provided by Bitdefender, and participant awards were supported by eMAG, partners who actively support education and encourage performance in the technology field.
A Growing Community
ONIA Winter Warmup Challenge 2025 confirms that there is a growing community of young people dedicated to the field of artificial intelligence and that Romania has a valuable pool of talents in this sector. The event represents an important step in consolidating a culture of excellence and collaboration in the technology field.
The ONIA team will continue organizing competitions and initiatives dedicated to training the new generation of artificial intelligence specialists.
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