Special Achievements - Sona College of Technology

Sona College presently offers 5 BE, 2 BTech and 11 ME programmes in many engineering and technology areas, MBA and MCA, and Ph.D programmes in 11 branches of science, engineering and management studies.
13 of the 20 programmes offered by the college are accredited by NBA (AICTE); six of these are UG programmes and seven are PG programmes.
Sona is an ISO-9001 Certified institution for the last six years.
52 well-equipped laboratories are attached to 12 academic departments.
Teaching Faculty: 300; Technical and Supporting Staff : 286.
No.of Ph.Ds: 36; Faculty currently pursuing Ph.D: 85; 235 Masters Degree Holders.
Staff - Student ratio: 1:13
Sona stands 10th among 242 Engineering Colleges in the state under Anna University of Technology in the May 2008 examinations.
Of 35 Self-supporting Engineering colleges surveyed in India for institutional excellence by OUTLOOK Magazine, Sona stands at the 27th position.
Sona Business School is rated ‘A’ by Business India Survey 2008; it is rated one among 100 B-School in India by Dalal Street Magazine for 2006, 2007 and 2008.
Anna University ranks secured by Sona students: 17 ranks in 2005, 21 in 2006, 18 in 2007 and 28 in 2008; of these rank-holder students nine are gold medalists.
Sona College has established 33 Centres of Excellence for Research and Development, and Extension Activities over the last three years. The areas of research include:
- Micro and Nano-technology
- Electric power engineering
- CAD/CAM
- VLSI and Embedded System
- Signal and Optical Networking
- PCB Design and Research
- Photonics
- Datamining and Database Technology
- Software Engineering
- Web Designing and Development
- Usable Security in Cyberspace
- Java Consultancy
- Multimedia Technology
- Earthquake-resistant Constructions
- Green Building Materials
- Speciality Textiles and Garments
- Sago Testing and Bio-fuel Research
- Computer Data Security
- Foreign Language Instruction and Research
- Rainfall and Radio-wave Propagation, etc

Of the 262 R & D projects completed and currently ongoing at the above centres, 126 are academic projects, 72 are sponsored projects and 64 are industrial projects.
20 patents have been filed so far.
Dr. S. Chandrasekar, Electrical and Electronic Engineering Department has,
- Received the AICTE Award for Young Teacher with a grant of Rs 10.50 lakhs for pursuing research on nano-composite materials for outdoor insulation applications.
- Visited University of Bologna, Italy for another collaborative research programme on partial discharge measuring system; the university is sponsoring the research work to the tune of Rs. 20 lakhs.

Dr. R.M.Arunachalam, Mechanical Engineering Department has,
- Received the AICTE Award for Young Teacher with a grant of Rs. 10.5 lakhs for pursuing research on combined micro-EDM and micro-ECM set-up
- Received the DST Award for Young Scientist with a grant of Rs 10.62 lakhs for research on low-cost synthesis of nano-structured materials
- Visited University of Nebraska, Lincoln for a research project on coated microelectrodes.

Sona College has a prestigious collaboration with ISRO, for which our EEE faculty team of researchers headed by
Dr. N. Kannan, Professor, EEE Department has designed and developed,
- Slotless brushless DC motor for ISRO’s Megha Tropiques Satellite, scheduled for launch in 2010
- Quadruplex brushless DC torque motor for ISRO’s C25 GSLV MK III Engine Gimbal Control Actuator

The team has also developed many principal-demonstration models for ISRO Space museums.
Many other projects for ISRO are in the pipeline.

Sona College has signed an MOU with IBM India Ltd for setting up a centre of excellence in IBM technologies
- Sona students have participated in the ”Great Mind Challenge Competition 2008”, a software development contest conducted by IBM throughout the country across 1500 colleges and secured a place among the top 30 best projects.

Sona was also awarded the “Great Performing College”, for its keen interest in sending the maximum number of teams for the contest.
Sona is one of the 50 colleges in India to have the satellite communication facility to receive online lectures by renowned US and European professors under the Indo-US E-learning initiative, for which the satellite communication equipment was sponsored by ISRO.
Sona is among the few institutions across the globe to undertake joint research work with CISCO Systems, San Francisco, US.
The institution is the nodal centre for promoting free open source software (FOSS) approved by Anna University of Technology and the Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (CDAC), a national resource centre for FOSS.
Sona has signed an MOU with Cypress Semiconductors, US for setting up a Programmable System on Chip (PSOC) Embedded System Development Lab in the college.
Sona has collaborated with Indira Gandhi Centre for Atomic Research (IGCAR-Chennai) for joint development of Open Source Based Automation Tools.
The IT major Infosys is Sona’s Industry partner for the Campus Connect programme aimed at student and staff development; Sona is one of the few colleges to have this linkage with Infosys.
Sona is the authorised training centre for SUN and ORACLE Certifications.
Testing and industrial consultancy services are offered to several units in and around Salem and a revenue of Rs.125 lakhs has been generated.

Continuing education: 99 programmes in the areas of engineering, technology, science and management studies have so far been organized for a total of 3115 participants; total revenue generated is Rs. 112 lakhs.

Sona has so far signed MOUs with 28 industries and other organizations.
Sona faculty are nominated to travel overseas to participate in conferences, present research papers, undergo post-doctoral fellowship, pursue Ph.D programmes and take part in inter-institution interactions.
Sona faculty publications during last three years include: 293 at national conferences, 178 at international conferences and 169 publications in national and international journals.
Three journals in business management are brought out by Sona School of Management.

Internet facilities available: 8 Mbps leased line throughout the campus with extension lines to Hostel and Library; optical fibre connectivity and Wifi Technology.

Comprehensive library: total number of volumes: 50220; national journals: 85; international journals: 80; technical and general magazines: 92; CD-ROMS for technical subjects: 2276.

Sona college has its own Multimedia Research and Development Centre called Sonaversity to produce educational learning resources: 65 books have been published in engineering, technology and management subjects; Web-based learning modules have also been developed for Tamil Virtual University.

Six student projects awarded prizes at the national level and 5 governmental and industrial organisations provided financial grants for the projects.
Two students secured 4th rank in the mechanical engineering problem statement design contest organized by BITS, Pilani.

During the last three years nearly 90 industrial organizations have visited the campus to conduct campus interviews and 1078 students have been placed, giving an average placement rate of about 75%.

Sona has an active music club called Sonaria; the club has an orchestra of talented student vocalists and instrumentalists and full-fledged musical instruments.
It trains students in classical, folk and western music and also gives performances within and outside the college.

Nearly a dozen student clubs function at Sona College; the main focus of the clubs include English Communication Skills, Women Development, Tamil Literature and Poetry, Science projects, International students, Cultural activities, horticulture and gardening, etc.

Sona’s sports facilities include a standard 400-metre track ground for athletics, various outdoor and indoor games, gymnasium, billiards room, half the Olympic size swimming pool, yoga centre and mini golf course.