Advancement of artificial intelligence with startups

Dr. Ammar Jalali Menesh, while explaining the obstacles to the development of artificial intelligence in the country, considered one of the important obstacles to the development of artificial intelligence in Iran to be the economic conditions and stated: On the one hand, the entrepreneurial ecosystem in the fields of technology in Iran is small, and on the other hand, the level The income in the society is low, and considering that artificial intelligence is dependent on processing facilities and hardware, it is considered a luxury item for our society; It means that only a small part of people can use its products and services. Therefore, perhaps the expectation of the market size of artificial intelligence products in advanced countries is not very realistic for Iran.

The deputy of Iran’s science and technology information in Irandak noted: Artificial intelligence is more than a pure product, it is an enabler and helps to improve the existing products and productions and increase their productivity, while our country is weak in the production of technological products. As a result, the number of products that can be improved using artificial intelligence is also small.

This university lecturer considered the next obstacle to the development of artificial intelligence in the country to be the problem of universities not being the center of the problem and said: Universities do not pay attention to the real applications of artificial intelligence, although Iran’s scientific productions in the field of artificial intelligence have high scientific value in some cases, but in most cases Items are not efficient. He continued: The tools and algorithms that are developed in academic research are far from creating software, services and products that solve industry problems and have a domestic or international market.

The vice president of Iran’s science and technology information stated in Irandak: Universities still do not have a problem-oriented approach. It is better to first define a real problem in the field of artificial intelligence, then theses, theses and researches in the university move towards it. Examples of these issues are reducing costs in urban management, intelligent energy management, diagnosis and treatment systems using artificial intelligence, intelligent urban and road traffic management, pollutant management, and intelligent environmental management.

In response to a question about the government’s support, Jalali Manesh said: “We are not looking for government support, although it is unfair to say that the government does not provide any support, even though the vice president’s science and technology department helps in holding events and costs for institutions’ equipment. It does, but we get most of the capital needed for entrepreneurial teams from private investors.

He continued: “The most important institution that is not helping us now is the university.” Unfortunately, universities operate in the field of artificial intelligence without identity and direction, while if they are properly guided and supported and properly politicized, they can be a good starting point for the production of products and services in the field of artificial intelligence. In fact, the pre-acceleration process of some entrepreneurial teams happens in universities and the results of many theses and projects and work teams formed in the university can be the input of the entrepreneurial ecosystem in the field of artificial intelligence.

Jalalimanesh stated: The first thing that the government can do is to direct the university from this laxity and indifference to a problem-oriented one and strengthen the connection of the university with the market, investors and the entrepreneurial ecosystem. The design of lessons and the mechanisms of teaching and research in the university should be changed and defined for the practical lessons of team projects that lead to product production. Because now, most of the specialized human resources are still trained in universities, and if they do not have skills and creativity, the country’s entrepreneurial ecosystem will suffer from a lack of human resources.

This lecturer of Amirkabir University noted: policymakers should give importance to the entrepreneurial ecosystem in a real way, not in a theatrical way, simplify the written laws and regulations as much as possible and facilitate the processes and regulations rather than trying to financially support entrepreneurship.

The promotion regulations or the systems that exist to evaluate universities do not pay attention to the employment of students, and in many cases, students who are even first students also have a job crisis. While an important part of university evaluation indicators should be based on how much professors or university institutions contribute to the entrepreneurial ecosystem and how real are the entrepreneurial ecosystems in these universities?

He considered the need for these changes to converge all components in universities and said: There is no alignment between the real needs of students and the design of university systems. Professors should converge more and design common lesson plans in a way that leads to creating a team and solving a real problem. Instead of training students who study, we should train students with the skills to solve a real problem.

Addressing the families who still believe that if someone is the first student, he will have a good future, he said: Students and families should know that if a student cannot solve a real problem, have real production and communicate with the business world and the market. slow, will not succeed.

In the continuation of his speech, the vice president of Iran’s science and technology information in Irandak pointed to the work done in Irandak and said: In the last few years, we have created several laboratories, including the human-machine interaction laboratory, and developed a product called “Robodak”. This social robot is the first Persian-speaking robot in the country that speaks, listens and answers in Farsi.

“Robodak” is an intelligent robot that helps the researcher in carrying out research activities such as searching and documenting. This research assistant robot has been created for a year and a half and now its second version is being developed. Despite the lack of financial resources in the research institute and the lack of support from the country’s science and technology institutions and the slowness in the development of this platform due to the lack of financial resources, the leaders of the human-machine interaction laboratory are looking for strategies to make this project self-sufficient and the private sector enter it. .

In the end, he noted: We at the Iran Science and Information Technology Research Institute (Irandoc) have created the first artificial intelligence specialized accelerator in the country with the help of the private sector under the brand name “Hamtek”.

In this accelerator, entrepreneurial teams, most of whom are students and graduates of the country’s top universities, are mentored by the most experienced domestic and international entrepreneurs, and after completing their products and services, they are introduced to investors and the industry for the next stages of growth, investment and maturity. spend yourself The first acceleration period started in the beginning of 2018 and now 6 teams of entrepreneurs are working in this accelerator, all of them working in the field of artificial intelligence. It is interesting to know that one of these teams is working on a product that was previously created as a team project for one of my undergraduate courses.