BIG DIVE is in the middle of its journey. The intensive training program about Data Science, Machine and Deep Learning, Data Visualization and Data Engineering is preparing to face the last two modules of the 2020 edition. Meanwhile, TOP-IX applied to become part of the Big Data Value Association (BDVA).

BIG DIVE main novelty has been the splitting of the course into four training modules, which replace the four consecutive full time weeks, that was the common feature in the previous eight editions. The new format has been appreciated by Divers. It allowed them to approach “step by step” the different topics of the constantly increasing Big Data theme, and to enter the program with different background and knowledge levels.

The BIG DIVE traveling companions were the same from beginning and as usual they contributed to the organization of the course. In addition to the TOP-IX consortium, Axant, the ISI Foundation and TODO are part of the team. We also confirmed the presence (someone in presence and others remotely) of guest lecturers, who brought their proven on-field experience to enrich the path of Divers.

Module 1 (“From Zero to Data Science with Python”), held on September, was taught by the TOP-IX team and covered the Python programming and Data Science, from the initial data explorations to the creation of data-driven projects. We hosted two lectures: “Geopandas and Geospatial data” by Maurizio Napolitano from the Bruno Kessler Foundation, “TimeSeries and KNIME”, curated by Daniele Tonini, partner in Target Research.

Module 2, organized in mid-October, was an intensive five- days deep on Machine and Deep Learning with a focus on computer vision. ISI Foundation researchers (Alan Perotti and Adnrè Panisson) were the resident teachers and we had three external lectures.
Alberto Danese, Head of Data Science at Nexi and Kaggle Grandmaster, spoke about the interpretability of Machine Learning models and shared his experience on the Kaggle platform, an online community of data scientists and Machine learning professionals based on challenges and awards promoted by international companies and organizations.
Marco Aldinucci and Iacopo Colonnelli, from the Computer Science Department at Università degli Studi di Torino, explored the connections between Machine Learning, Deep Learning and High Performance Computing and Cloud, based on the experience gained with academic research and with the HPC4AI project. Finally, Matteo Giaretti, senior data scientist at Glovo and ex-diver, after talking about machine learning processes in Glovo, offered a detailed excursus on the forecasting capabilities of yesterday, today and tomorrow, with specific reference to the world of Time Series (series historical data).

A total of 15 Divers took part in the first two modules, which rise to 22 considering who have enrolled in the third and fourth modules (the registrations are still open). Someone chose to participate in a single module, some others have picked modules according to their needs and someone decided to follow all the four modules.
The average age of the Divers is 33, the citizenship is predominantly Italian, except for a Cameroonian participant living here in Turin: on this side the health emergency had a strong impact by limiting international participation. In the first two modules, the divers followed the lessons mostly in presence, with the exception of one participant in Module 2.
Based on Covid-19 security rules and the evolution of the infections, we will decide whether the third and fourth modules will take place in the classroom or through video conference. In both cases, the training system is solid as well as the available teaching tools.

Module 3 will be held starting from November 16th and will focus on the theme “Communicating and Visualizing Data”. The resident teacher will be Fabio Franchino from TODO; guest lecture has been already confirmed: Matteo Moretti, co-founder at Sheldon Studio. BIG DIVE 2020 will close with Module 4, “Deep Dive into Data Engineering”, scheduled from November 30th to December 4th.

For modules three and four, registrations are still open (here the form).

To strengthen its role in the Big Data, Data Science and Data Engineering sector, the TOP-IX Consortium has recently applied to become part of the Big Data Value Association (BDVA), formed by a balanced mix of industries of large, small and medium-sized, which represents the private counterpart of the European Commission for the implementation of the Big Data Value PPP program.
In this way, TOP-IX places itself in a key role in the Turin scenario, where the Italian Institute for Artificial Intelligence (I3A) will be located.

L'articolo TOP-IX between BIG DIVE and the Big Data Value Association sembra essere il primo su TOP-IX.

During EURegionsWeek, TOP-IX will be in Brussels to propose the side event “Trusted policy-making in the digital era. Smarter citizens engagement and decision process“.

A data-driven approach gives the opportunity to design effective strategies and base policy decisions on sound evidence. It is important to explore #impacts and #opportunities at the intersection of #technologies and data-driven approaches with policy and decision-making processes.

The seminar focuses on this point, presenting and discussing the #benefits for decision-makers in using smart data platforms and interconnected #services, such as spatial planning or #social network modeling. It is also an opportunity to discover #innovative EU-funded projects’ solutions and other best #practices.

The event will take place in the spaces of the Piedmont Region Delegation to the EU in Brussels, on Tuesday 8 October, from 10.30am to 1pm. Seminar agenda:

10:30 – 10:50 Introduction
Matteo Marnati – Regional Minister of Environment, Innovation and Research and Digital Agenda at Regione Piemonte.
Davide Calonico – President at TOP-IX.

10:50 – 11:05 THE MODERN POLICY-MAKING CHALLENGE
Andrea Boccuni – Head of International Partnership and Education at The Good Lobby – “Instruments for democratic participation: Best practices in modern policy-making.”

11:05 – 12:00 TECHNOLOGIES AND APPROACHES TO SUPPORT DECISION AND POLICY-MAKING

#EU FUNDED PROJECTS
Guido Boella – Coordinator of CO3project (Co-create, Co-produce and Co-manage) – “CO3, Digital Disruptive Technologies to Co-create, Co-produce and Co-manage Open Public Services along with Citizens.”
Lieven Raes – Coordinator of PoliVisu (Policy Development based on Advanced Geospatial Data Analytics and Visualisation) – “Policy Visualisation – Helping cities to become more sustainable with open and big data.”

#BEST PRACTICES
Sylvie Occelli – Head of Research Unit at IRES Piemonte – “A tool for designing integrated policy actions: can we reason together?”
Sarah Wolf – Researcher at Global Climate Forum – “Decision Theatre – a process for communication, research, and decision support.”

12:00 – 12:15 SUPPORT TO EU DECISION-MAKING
Andrea Conte – Team Leader European Commission Joint Research Centre – “Big Data & Modelling. Rhomolo Model and the EU Impact Assessments.”

Info and registration on Eventbrite.

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From June 6th to July 8th, the TOP-IX Consortium, in collaboration with ISI Foundation, ToDo and Axant.it, organizes the FIFTH edition of BIG DIVE, a 5-week training program aimed at enhancing the technical skills needed to dive in the world of BIG DATA, extract value and generate social and economic impact. Registrations are open: early price until March 13th; standard price until May 8th.

Moved aside from the media hype, the term BIG DATA is now a prerogative of many services and products in the ICT sector (and not only). Although many open source players, as well as the big firms in the corporate market developed and released all-in-one platforms, tools, and software libraries to simplify and improve the efficiency of information management, the human factor continues to play a key role to create knowledge from data and to enable data-driven decision making processes.
Professionals skilled in handling the data and the complexity of the living web, on a technical side and/or on a management side, are daily requested by companies, start-ups and government institutions.
BIG DIVE from 2012 aims to address this pain, training professionals able to deal with the BIG DATA challenges.
In this highly competitive scenario (due to the proliferation of university tracks and master classes as well as punctual courses and bootcamps), the competitive advantages of BIG DIVE are the same pillars on which it was designed.

/ The “bits-on – hands-on” approach;
/ The value of teachers;
/ The intensive and multidisciplinary program;
/ The physical interaction in the classroom;
/ The International perspective;
/ The real dataset provided to the students for the final project;
/ The network created over the years in scientific and business fields.

The call to visit the www.bigdive.eu site is obviously directed to wanna-be data scientists, but also hackers, computational designers, employees or founders in data-driven start-ups, PHD researchers, postdoctoral researchers and students interested in mastering the true nature of Data Science.

To quote the Diver Jonas Liechti: “Everybody who would like to swim in the ocean of data should go to Big Dive. Because if you do not want to drown you’d better learn how to ‘dive’.”

Registration is open until May 8th (standard price), while you can take advantage of the early price until March 13th.

L'articolo BIG DIVE 5: registrations are officially open sembra essere il primo su TOP-IX.

I-COM Data Venture Challenge, will showcase top data-driven startups from around the world which leverage value from Marketing Data & Measurement as a major selling point of their product(s) or services.
To participate in the fourth edition just fill out the registration form by January 15th, 2016.
The competition boasts nine awards: the Overall Winner, the Emerging Market Regions Award, and other seven specific categories such us General, Attribution, CRM, Mobile, Programmatic, Social Media and Video.
Each start-up is allowed to participate in only one category.
I-COM Data Venture Challenge Board & Jury will select the Official Selection finalists, that will take part to the Final Round of Judging, during I-COM Global Summit, in Seville, from April 18th till April 21st.

For start-ups, this event is a unique opportunity to be discovered by their dream potential customers and investors and propelled to the next level of development.

Due to its role in supporting start-ups (Development Program) and its many activities in the Big Data sector (e.g. BIG DIVE), TOP-IX Consortium is one of the I-COM Data Venture Challenge 2016’s Innovation Partners.

L'articolo TOP-IX is Innovation Partner in I-COM Data Venture Challenge sembra essere il primo su TOP-IX.