Defi Ingenieurs 3 - Destination Futur
- Brand
- SNCF
- Year
- 2016
- Objective
- Lead Gen & Recruiting
- Industry
- Automotive
- Mechanic
- Adventure & Quest
- Platform
- Web
- Agency
- Marie-Laure Cruschi
- With
- Else
- With
- DAN Paris
- With
- TBWA\Paris
Objective
SNCF needs to hire roughly 1,000 engineers and executives every year, and Défi Ingénieurs was built as a live recruitment funnel into France's top engineering schools. The third season set out to pull in the best students and new graduates while recasting the rail operator as a builder of tomorrow's mobility — AI-driven robots, big data, 3D printing, smart energy grids — rather than a legacy transport company.
Solution
Players open the browser game at defi-ingenieurs.sncf.com and step into an illustrated future-world built around five challenges, each modeled on a problem SNCF's own engineers work on. Every stage opens with a short video brief, then hands the player an engineering puzzle to solve through direct play — steering with the keyboard or, new that season, turning a smartphone into a gamepad. Finishing a challenge posts a score to a live leaderboard that ranks the player individually and ranks their school against every other school in the competition. The better the run, the higher the standing, and the season closes with the top scorers and top schools moving from the browser into a live final at SNCF headquarters.
Results
180 engineering schools and universities entered the online qualifying stage, competing over roughly four months to April 18, 2016. The top five students from each of the nine highest-scoring schools — 45 students in total — advanced to a live final on June 24, where teams had two hours to build a working engineering solution; separately, the 50 highest-ranked online players won prizes ranging from GoPro cameras to trips across Europe and France.
- 1
The player opens the browser game at defi-ingenieurs.sncf.com and enters an illustrated futuristic world built around SNCF, populated with AI robots and big data imagery.
- 2
Before starting, the player chooses how to control the game: a standard desktop keyboard, or a paired smartphone used as a gamepad, a new option in this third season.
- 3
The player registers and selects an engineering school; scores feed both a personal leaderboard and a school leaderboard where 180 schools compete against each other.
- 4
The game presents five separate challenges, each designed by real SNCF engineers around a different future-mobility problem. Each one opens with a short video briefing that sets up a real SNCF production scenario before gameplay begins, and each demands precise calculations rather than just quick reactions.
- 5
In the "3D Printing" challenge, the player models a spare part for maintaining rolling stock.
- 6
In the "Concept Train" challenge, the player designs a future Transilien commuter train.
- 7
In the "Robot Baggage" challenge, the player operates an AI-driven robot that carries passengers' luggage.
- 8
In the "Flow Management" challenge, the player routes passenger flows through a station and clears bottlenecks.
- 9
In the "Smart Grid" challenge, the player generates energy to keep trains running further.
- 10
Final scores rank players nationally: the top 50 win trips across Europe and France plus GoPro cameras, and the strongest schools advance to a live final at SNCF headquarters, where five-student teams have two hours to develop an engineering solution before a jury.
