Prysmian Group R&D interns detail their internship experience

In this article you can read our interview with Uwais Abudulla Aman and Nitish Kulkarni and their internship experience at Prysmian Group. They are currently Electrical Power Engineering master students specializing in high voltage at TU Delft. For the past four months, they have been interning at the Prysmian Group R&D department in Delft. Uwais Aman, 26 and Nitish Kulkarni, 24 detail the challenges they faced, the projects that they worked on and their advice to future interns.

Challenges faced
A usual day as High Voltage (HV) Engineering intern consist of both theoretical and practical tasks which start of by doing research, brainstorming sessions, data calculations and concluding with a solution.

“Our solutions are not just put away in a drawer, they really do implement it and we could see that by how our idea is incorporated into the projects next-step” mentioned Uwais on the work progress.

“A typical day is not a typical day, it is going to change every day and you never know what exactly you’re going to be engaged with but it is very thrilling” says Nitish. They describe their experience as unique and very interesting because of the various challenges they were apart of and the versatility of how their work. They continue by stating  that managers and supervisors are not just there to guide them but they also work along side them. 

The projects
While working on their internship assignment, both students agreed that their activities were not only big and interesting but also very challenging. Prysmian Group and TU Delft have collaborated in various projects together, this time being no different. Uwais explains how he was able to benefit from this by working on the topic of ‘Design and analysis of 550kV outdoor cable termination’ for his university assignment. “I learnt quite a lot not just in the technical aspect but also in my time-management, interpersonal skills and the experience of the managers made the road to a successful assignment much smoother.” Aside from the university assignment, Uwais is working on designing a new innovative link box for the company.
Nitish on the other hand had a different approach, he chose a topic which does not have a lot of literature available thus a very uncommon and challenging topic to work on titled ‘Transient analysis of metal enclosed cable termination’. By starting from scratch, building models, testing stimulations and applying the knowledge he attained from his courses, he was able to work alongside different teams such engineering which helped him gain an overall knowledge of the industry.
 

Prysmian Experience
This experience has made the students think outside of the box. Nitish goes on to say that, when you are studying there is academic approach but, when working there is a practical and slightly different approach and this has taught him to change his perspective on how he solves a problem. He goes on to explain that when working on a project it is always good to directly reach out to someone that has more experience as this can lead to discussions and better end results because everyone is good at something. Additionally, Uwais says that Prysmian Group has given him the opportunity to think different and this has peaked more interest in HV engineering. 

Advice to future to students
The students advice to future interns is to not be afraid of asking questions because the Prysmian Group colleagues are there to help answer any of your concerns. They going on to say do not hesitant to challenge yourself more, because in the end you are going to look back and  feel proud to see that you’ve accomplished your goal and that will only give you more motivation.

“The best part is that Prysmian Group offers you projects and topics that are not direct and straight forward and that is the exact definition of innovation, it is nice, it is fun, it is ENJOYABLE”.  

Furthermore, the students went on to say that they would definitely recommend other students to do a similar internship at Prysmian. They suggest to, “look for the opportunities that the company has to offer and choose what fits you best”.