AI Singapore Unveils New Programs and Partners with Ocean Protocol to Develop AI Research Talent and Accelerate AI Innovation for Industry Transformation

AI Singapore (AISG) announced that it will launch two new programmes — the AISG Industrial Postgraduate Programme and the AISG Fellowship Programme — to train AI research talent in strategic industrial areas and to engage Singapore’s top AI experts to help narrow the gap between academic research and industry solutions. As part of a research collaboration, AISG will partner Ocean Protocol as the first organization to sponsor postgraduate students under the AISG Industrial Postgraduate Programme.

Under the AISG Industrial Postgraduate Programme (IPP), AISG will train postgraduate students to deliver meaningful and purpose-based AI research that can be applied by the industry partners sponsoring the research. Through this collaboration, the students get to work on advanced research that is directly relevant to the industry and are exposed to their R&D processes. The industry partners will be enabled to quickly translate the outcomes of cutting-edge AI research into new products and services, raising their level of competence. The administration of the IPP will be supported by the universities which offer the postgraduate degrees.

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As the pioneer partner under this programme, Ocean Protocol will fund 4 PhD students to work on AI research and develop technologies, models and governance to enable borderless data sharing for AI. Specific areas of research include:

• Decentralized data science and AI applications
• Decentralized federated machine learning
• Token engineering of a data & AI services economy
• Economics of a token-based data & AI services economy

“AI is extremely promising for humanity. It can help to address some of society’s greatest problems and unlock immense value for businesses. But, AI needs data. Yet the most valuable data is stuck in silos, unusable. Ocean Protocol solves this. It’s a blockchain-based platform for safe sharing of data for use by AI, in turn to address challenges in society & business,” said Trent McConaghy, Founder of Ocean Protocol. “We are proud to be partnering with AI Singapore to develop the nation’s AI talents, to promote the sharing of private and open data for the betterment of humanity, and ultimately advancing AI development for Singapore.”

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The AISG Fellowship Programme is a prestigious programme aimed at engaging Singapore’s top AI researchers and faculty members in AISG’s activities and the local AI ecosystem. Among the incentives and benefits, AISG Fellows will be able to work with: i) AISG postgraduate students and interns on research projects and thesis work; ii) AISG industry partners on research collaboration, translation and consulting engagements and iii) the AI ecosystem to facilitate research translation, commercialization and spin-off opportunities. Joining the AISG Fellowship program is by invitation or by application. The program is open to faculty members and researchers at local institutes of higher learning and A*STAR. The programme will be formally launched in Q2, 2019. AI Singapore and Ocean Protocol will be targeting the first batch of AISG Fellows as supervisors for the joint IPP.

A Memorandum of Understanding signing ceremony between AI Singapore’s Chief Scientist, Professor Chen Tsuhan and Ocean Protocol’s Founder, Trent McConaghy was held at the announcement of the new initiatives.

“We are hopeful that these innovative programmes will empower AI talents to conduct advanced research and bring it to practice. Ocean Protocol has recognised the need to directly collaborate closely with our top AI experts and reduce the time to translate state-of-the-art research. We believe that there are other companies who share the same vision. We hope to have IPPs arranged with these companies and invite them to come talk to us,” said Professor Chen.

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