From imagination to impact

High Impact Research DirectionsDavid SkellernCEO

Presentation overview

• About NICTA• NICTA’s Research Directions

– Themes and business areas– NICTA’s approach to research

• Some examples• Strategic planning at NICTA• Why strategic planning is important

About NICTA

NICTA• National ICT Research

Centre of Excellence• Not-for-profit Company• $83m per annum including

- Australian Gov (~60%)

- Regional Gov (~15%)

Recruit commercial and research staff from Australian

and global communities

Seven university joint venture partners

contribute researchers and students

R&D partnerships with industry, research institutes & universities

Spin-outs, licensing &collaborations with leading users & industry

Knowledge diffusion andenhanced ICT skills base

NICTA Founders & Partners

(2003) (2004) (2005)(2002)

NICTA Vision and Mission

Our Vision is that our imaginative research drives Australia’s ICT

future

Our Mission is to be an enduring world-class information

and communications technology research institute that generates national benefit

NICTA Objectives

Our People objective is to bring together world-class researchers and professional staff, enhance their skills and build a culture of entrepreneurship and achievement in use-inspired basic research, enhancing Australia’s ICT capacity and capability.

Our Research objective is to carry out research that advances knowledge, is recognised for its excellence and generates breakthrough, user-focused technologies.

Our Education objective is to work with universities to provide Australia with ICT researchers who have deep technical expertise supported by strong professional and entrepreneurial skills.

Our Linkages objective is to increase our impact and results by working with targeted research, government, education, industry and domain partners.

Our Commercialisation objective is to facilitate technology transfer and create channels to market for NICTA research.

What Will Success Look Like?

Measurable industry growth & competitiveness from NICTA research outcomes

Measurable industry growth & competitiveness from NICTA research outcomes

Stronger ICT skill base – NICTA alumniStronger ICT skill base – NICTA alumni

National benefit from NICTA research

outcomes

National benefit from NICTA research

outcomes

National benefit through a stronger ICT

Skills base

National benefit through a stronger ICT

Skills base

One of the world’s top 10 ICT research centres by 2020One of the world’s top 10 ICT research centres by 2020Research expertise

and scaleResearch expertise

and scale

Business Model

090721 NICTA Overview 10

NICTA People

705 people (June 09)– 273 full-time PhD students– 432 staff (373 FTE)

Staff (FTE) and students by sites - update– 131 / 55: Sydney - Eveleigh Aust. Tech Park Lab &

HQ– 53 / 66: Sydney - Kensington Neville Roach Lab– 69 / 62: Canberra: Canberra Research Lab– 74 / 97: Melbourne: Victoria Research Lab– 41 / 18: Brisbane: Queensland Research Lab– 5: Adelaide: Office

So how are we going after 6.5 years?

• 11 technology licence agreements• 4 spinout companies

• 107 PhD graduates from NICTA partner universities• Alumni in universities, industry and government

• 75 active patent applications • > 3300 publications • > 130 prizes and awards

NICTA’s role - How

NICTA’s unique partnership with universities:

• Produces high quality PhD graduates who have additional professional opportunities and training through NICTA

• Maintains NICTA’s intellectual vigor through contributions of world class university researchers                                                        

• Achieves national benefit by harnessing disparate university ICT researchers and building critical mass to achieve international impact.

NICTA’s role - How

NICTA has a systemic approach to achieving significant national outcomes from its research:

• Our use-inspired basic research approach ensures that research is undertaken only after competitor and market analysis confirm good prospects for impact.

• Our aim is to make step changes in knowledge that are embodied in technology platforms to allow the research to be more readily transferred into use across the economy.

• Commercial considerations are imbedded into our projects at the outset and ongoing entrepreneurial support works to transfer research outcomes into commercial results.

NICTA’s model: Use-Inspired Basic Research

• Our challenge is to develop long term projects that will both advance knowledge and enable the development of globally competitive products, processes or services.

Use-inspired basic

research

Use-inspired basic

research

Purely applied research &

development

Purely applied research &

development

Pure basic research

Pure basic research

Approach to Research

New Knowledge

New Technology

ExistingTechnology

ExistingKnowledge

ICT CapabilityICT Capability

Themes

Researchers are grouped across the company by Theme:

Embedded Systems – developing ‘smart’ productsNetworked Systems – technology that connects

‘smart’ products to form ‘smart’ networks Making Sense of Data – making sense of large

amounts of data created by ICT systemsManaging Complexity - designing ICT systems

that are fit for purpose, cost effective and don’t have nasty side effects

ThemesThemes

• What they are– Larger collections of research capability– The line management structure of our research– A good level of aggregation for joint strategic planning with

partner universities

• Why we have them– A vehicle for long range (10 years) strategic planning...– ... Which will hopefully engender larger, riskier higher payoff

projects– A home for Lab staff

• Who we encourage (insist!) they have around 30% unstructured unmanaged time for research

• Great ideas start in a single person’s head...

Business AreasBusiness Areas

Our Business Areas are the sectors in which we build market knowledge and commercialisation experience.

They are where we seek the majority of our use inspiration.

• Biomedical and Life Sciences• Intelligent Transportation Systems• Safety and Security• Mobile Systems and Services• Software Infrastructure• Environmental Management

Themes and Business Areas

NICTA’s Research Directions

a selection!

Embedded Systems Research Areas

• GOAL: Model-driven process for fitting architectures and designs to problems.

• Challenge: Combine with “Design by Composition” approach for re-use.

• Virtual System Prototyping

Embedded Systems Engineering 1

Embedded Systems Research Areas

Secure, Reliable, TrustworthyEmbedded Software 2

• GOAL: De-facto standard for vendors of embedded systems.

• Trustworthy microkernel-based operating systems

• Component-based systems constructed upon microkernel.

• System services to higher-level layers, such as a secure GUI.

• Distributed Systems & Multi-Core

Embedded Systems Research Areas

• GOAL: World-leading computer vision systems for dynamic scene understanding.

• Smart networked cameras with reconfigurable architectures

• Computer Vision processing for bionic eye• Combination of geometric and statistical

methods =>Moving Cameras + Moving Objects

Dynamic Scene Understandingon Visual Sensor Networks 3

Embedded Systems Research Areas

• GOAL: Pervasive wireless systems and sensors.• Single Chip WPAN in CMOS at 60GHz

– Integrated radio transceiver with phased antenna array

– Digital baseband, MAC processing– WirelessHD, 802.11.AD (WiGig)

• Sensor technologies & applications– Body Area Networking– Implanted devices

Wireless systems and Sensors on-a-Chip 4

Embedded Systems Research Areas

• GOAL: Systems that adapt to changing requirements.

• Reconfigurable systems with HW/SW agents. Integrate 3rd party components.

• Breakthrough scalable architecure

Reconfigurable Systems5

Solving real problems creates impact

Impact comes from applying ICT to real world problems!

• Making the digital economy more accessible to Australians.• Help maximise the efficiency of Australia’s infrastructure

and logistics through advanced systems which speed-up and simplify traffic, freight, port and airport operations and will also assist streamlined delivery of emergency services

• Maximising farm yield by developing and deploying ICT systems which minimise the use of scarce water resources

Strategic issues for NICTA – future outcomes

4. Safer food produced more efficiently for Australians and as exports.

5. Computer technologies for enhanced health and well-being, including bionic eye and improved cancer treatment.

6. Gain without the pain: effective service delivery to government and business without the implementation and cost

7. Hybrid vehicle control development in Australia driving competitive global green vehicle manufacturing

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inventing next generation Internet infrastructure

Research for the Digital Economy

bringing everyday services to the Digital Economy

• Human body monitoring for sport and medicine

• Building confidence through mobile security - already in over

250 million mobile phones

• Content compression for mobile devices

devices delivering reliable data for the Digital Economy

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re • Increasing capacity and reliability of the existing Internet backbone

• Creating the next generation Internet with EU and US researchers

• Increasing wireless Internet capacity outdoors

• Developing wireless for home high-definition entertainment

Fast and scalable social networking

Remote office applications

Automatic update of in-car navigation systems

Efficient movement of goods

Applications bringing together content and services, securely over the broadband network

Personalised medicine

Location aware media distribution

More crop for less water

Digital conveyancing and mortgages

enabling new applications in the Digital Economy

NICTA

GENERIC DIGITAL ENABLERS eg• Context/Location • SOA• Security • Optimisation• Mobility

• Search• Cognitive • Systems• Collaboration• Cloud/Virtualisation (computing, storage …)

SECTOR SPECIFIC eg• transport, health, water, logistics, eGov, emergency, enterprise …

Lending Industry Example

LIXI Valuations Reference Implementation

Internet

LenderBPEL engine

Valuation request

Backchannel

Valuation report

Internal Workflow

• Task Mgt•Applications

Internal Workflow

• Task Mgt•Applications

ValuerBPEL engine

Intelligent Transport Systems

Active Traffic Management

Our 2020 Vision

A significant and measurable

reduction in thetotal social cost attributable to

congestion.

A significant and measurable

reduction in thetotal social cost attributable to

congestion.

If nothing is done, the total avoidable social cost of congestion in Australia will exceed $20bn per annum by 2020”

– BTRE 2007

And that’s about 1% of GDP!!! (…and that’s reflected world-wide)

A new, better informed Traffic Management

Infrastructure

+Better decision support

and incident management

Smart Sensing

• Data Fusion ++

• Invariant feature detection• Headlights• Windscreens• Edges• …

• Shadow/reflection removal

• Low camera height

Classification, flows, speeds, queue lengths, incidents with occlusion in extreme conditions (weather/light)

Control Optimisation

loop detectors,cameras, etc

Control actions(switch lights)

Actuators

Sensors

Dynamic Traffic Model

Smart Intersection Control

Optimise Control Plan

Albion Park Test Bed

• Major intersection of Pacific Hwy and Illawarra Hwy

• Currently roundabout controlled• Grid-lock in AM and PM peak hours • All day grid-lock in

vacations • Problem caused greater

traffic flows than original design scenario

• Installed signals…now…• Further opportunities for

efficiency.

Cameras at Albion Park

Albion Park Test Bed

Entire Transport System Design & Optimization

Example: For Technologically and Economically Developed Countries• Optimizing the control of vehicles, traffic & infrastructure to:

– Minimize – fuel intake, emissions, traffic impact on infrastructure costs– Maximize – static & dynamic safety, energy conversion efficiency – Guarantee – sustainability of energy use and impact on global climate

change

Strategic Planning at NICTA

Strategic planning at NICTA

• Important for ensuring outcomes for our research

• Strategic planning occurs at three levels:– NICTA Corporate Strategic Plan 2007-2011– Research Theme Strategic Plans– Project Strategic Plans

Theme Strategic Plans Theme Strategic Plans

• What– 10-20 page high-level 10 year research visions

• Why?– To develop longer range, higher risk, step-change projects– Useful for relations with universities and other strategic

linkages– Connection with international linkage strategies

• Status– Beginning to have some influence– Fair to say its a hard sell – But we are convinced it is the right thing to try

Why Strategic Planning is Important

Why strategic planning is important

Dr Michael Spence, Vice Chancellor University of Sydney

Talk of a “mission statement” in a university and many of our colleagues will roll their eyes. Others will hardly be so polite. But however difficult it may be to articulate the primary purpose of an institution so complex and diverse as ours, the process can be very helpful. It helps to know our goals, and while they may never be fully realised, and measurement is difficult, to know how well we are doing in achieving them.

Why strategic planning is important

Strategic planning gives direction and establishes co-ordinated effort. It also minimises wasted effort and redundancy.

• Arenas: where will we be active? • Vehicles: how will we get there?• Differentiators: how will we win in the market

place?• Staging: what will be our speed and sequence

of moves?• Economic logic: how will we obtain our returns?

Why strategic planning is important

NICTA’s Theme Strategic Plans:• Specify the research areas where we want to

achieve impact• Specify our goals within those areas• How we will get there

• Provides a clear direction for our researchers.

• Ensures co-ordinated research effort• Minimises wasted effort.

Why strategic planning is important

Strategic planning sets standards of success and performance

• How will you achieve your objectives?

• How will you know when you’ve got there?

• What measures or targets will you use?

• Who are your competitors, and what is your differentiator, or ‘edge’?

Why strategic planning is important

Strategic planning empowers people to make decisions and take initiatives.

• Collective purpose and shared research direction

•‘Buy-in’ from team members

•Maintaining flexible parameters to empower researchers

Strategic plans also play an important role for people outside the organisation or team.

Questions?

Research Overview

Themes Disciplines Business AreasICT used for…

• Trust and Security • Reliable Operating Systems• Tools and Platforms for ES

• Trust and Security • Reliable Operating Systems• Tools and Platforms for ES

Embedded Systems

Embedded Systems

• Communications Stack• Sensor Network Platforms• Networking Technologies

• Communications Stack• Sensor Network Platforms• Networking Technologies

Networked Systems

Networked Systems

• Formal Methods• Software Design Process• Constraints• Control• Optimisation

• Formal Methods• Software Design Process• Constraints• Control• Optimisation

ManagingComplexityManaging

Complexity

•Machine Learning•Reasoning•Knowledge Representation•Image Understanding•Data Understanding•HxI (Human-x Interaction)

•Machine Learning•Reasoning•Knowledge Representation•Image Understanding•Data Understanding•HxI (Human-x Interaction)

Making Sense of Data

Making Sense of Data

Biomedical and Life SciencesBiomedical and Life Sciences

Intelligent Transportation Systems Intelligent Transportation Systems

Safety and SecuritySafety and Security

Environmental ManagementEnvironmental Management

Mobile Systems and ServicesMobile Systems and Services

Software InfrastructureSoftware Infrastructure

NICTA’s role - Why

Where is the Australian ICT sector now?

• ~9% (~$98B FY2007) of Australian economy• Sector trade deficit of $21B (FY2007)• Export performance $5.7B 0.18% sector

worldwide, including re-exports of over $1.4B

• Composed of Australian SMEs and relatively small subsidiaries of MNCs

• There is no large Australian MNC ICT company• 26500 companies• < 1% (~260) have 100 or more staff• 95% have < 20 staff