Our trip to TimeMachine.ai event at Austin TX.
In the previous post I wrote about our experience in the BBVA Hackathon, in this post I will cover our journey at Timemachine.ai event at Austin TX.
After winning the BBVA Hackathon GlobalHITSS challenge our team Carlos Alberto Haro , David Rivera Flores and I were awarded with a trip to TimeMachine.ai event sponsored by SparkCognition. Here many top AI companies and people in the field were invited to participate.
SparkCognition is an Austin TX cloud based AI company which provides a fully managed deep learning platform for companies to perform data analytics, machine learning modeling and deployment. It has solutions for different sectors ranging from Oil & Gas, Aviation, cybersecurity, finance, manufacturing, etc.
The event took place in the Palmer Events Center in Austin TX and lasted for 2 days (November 13 and 14, 2019).
Our trip started on a Tuesday, November 12th, at 7 am (had to wake up really early!!) . We flew from Mexico City to Atlanta where we had our first lay over. Upon arriving at Atlanta’s airport, we were seriously amazed by its size and later found out that it is the biggest airport in terms of passengers count in the world (pretty amazing !!).
As our stop in Atlanta lasted for a few hours, we decided to get busy so we grabbed lunch, took a quick tour of the airport and briefly stopped at a book store where we browsed some books. To my surprise, I encountered books that I was really interested in buying, in particular a collection by an awesome author called Malcolm Gladwell.
After a short time in Atlanta and with new books :) we flew to Austin which was our final destination.
At Austin, we stayed at the Holiday Inn Hotel, which by the way has great accommodations, excellent customer service, and a spectacular view of the Lady Bird Lake. Another point in favor of this Hotel is its proximity to Rainey Street where we had lunch and drank a beer later on in the day (and of course some partying the next day! ).
We first dropped our luggage off at the hotel, rested for a little while, and then headed to Rainey Street to enjoy the afternoon. I had a hotdog for lunch and knocked down a couple of beers. We slept early that night in order to be 100% ready for the event the next day.
The main theme of the event was Artificial Intelligence and Neural Networks’s application to a variety of industries including: energy, security, military, art, entertainment. We were exposed to new possibilities by AI being enabled in a way we never before imagined. People from different countries participated including the USA, Mexico, China, etc.
In my opinion, the most notorious speakers on wednesday were the following:
- Doctor Bruce Porter, Chief Science Office at SparkCognition and computer science professor at UT Austin.
He gave a really good introductory talk about these topics:
- The fundamentals of machine learning
- The differences between correlation and causation
- How machine learning and deep learning has evolved over the years.
2. Bobby Ray Inman, a retired United State Navy who served many intelligence positions in the government. He was also nominated by ex-president Bill Clinton to become secretary of defense during his time as president, however he declined the offer. Admiral Inman spoke about his experience as head of NSA, the main challenges he faced, and how technology with AI had a dramatic impact on security. He also spoke about the relationship between the United States and China in the context of global trade.
3. John Chambers, former executive chairman and CEO of Cisco Systems for 20+ years. This is an outstanding achievement given the fact that the average CEO’s lifetime as head of a company is only 5 years. He spoke about his achievements as Cisco’s CEO and he explained how he managed to sustain an annual growth rate of 31% over 24 years. John also emphasized the relevance of investing heavily in R&D to stay competitive in today’s industries.
4. General Raymond A. Thomas, a retired general officer of the United States Army and former commander of United States Operations Command. His conference consisted on how AI is being used in the military to improve security operations across the globe. General Thomas spoke about deep learning and it’s applications mainly in the field of image processing in terms of direct unmaned aerial vehicles for exploration, drone fleet management and aerial unmaned weapons control.
After finishing the first day of conferences, we took a tour of the city visiting the downtown area, the Capitol and University of Texas-Austin.
Next day, another round of really cool conferences where imparted. My personal favorites were:
- Robert “Bob” Metcalfe. A brilliant businessman, electronic engineer, the creator of the Ethernet communications protocol and several communications companies (3COM). He could easily be considered the father of the Internet. Bob gave a wonderful lecture about his trajectory, his contributions to the field and explained his famous “Metcalfe’s Law” which is fundamental in telecommunications networks theory. The theory states that the value of a network is proportional to the square of the number of connected users or nodes. This means that by adding a new node to a network and connecting this node to every other node, a non-linear increase in relationships is accomplished. Metcalfe’s law is of major relevance because it relates the amount of nodes, the value generated and the cost of telecommunications networks.
2. Another great conference was imparted by Byron Reese, a spectacular businessman and author, who was also presenting his newest book called The Fourth Age. The main topic of this book is about how artificial intelligence, robotics and technology in general are dramatically changing our lives and how we can leverage it for the best. Reese’s work reminded me of Yuval Noah Harari book Homo Deus in the sense that it presents some futuristic scenarios that we as humankind will likely face in the following years.
3. Robert Work is a former deputy defense secretary and businessman founder of his own company (called teamwork). He gave a master conference about the future of warfare, how it is shifting to a more algorithmic type of war or “hyperwar”, the ethical implications of the development of AI powered weapons, the use of decision support systems, the implementation of predictive maintenance and many other things concerning the future of war.
4. Amir Husain: Founder and CEO of SparkCognition, gave the closing speech at the event with a superb presentation were he presented his vision about the direction in which humankind is heading to with the advances of AI. Amir Husain’s vision is portrayed in his book “The Sentient Machine”, covering a broad range of topics where AI is having a tremendeous impact such as the internet of things, healthcare, finance and cybersecurity among others. Both his conference and his book invites everyone (regardless of their knowledge about the topic) to involve themselves in the fascinating world of AI. I found “The Sentient Machine” an extremely enriching book, necessary for any leader who wishes to catch up with the most recent developments and the potential AI has to transform almost every industry.
After the event’s closure, we decided to chill that afternoon, did some shopping , ate delicious burgers, had some beers and ended partying at 6th street. However our party ended early (2am), because, quoting an uber driver: “No more alcohol after 2 am in the state of Texas, if you want to keep drinking after that hour go to Mexico or Louisina”.
Next day Friday November 15th, our trip came to an end and we returned to Mexico city. We were very happy with the experience, excited about what we had learned, looking forward to implement this knowledge in our jobs and on our personal projects. Overall, we also really enjoyed the experience of getting to know Austin Texas which we found to be a wonderful city.
Final remarks
The whole trip was an outstanding experience for us since it was our first time attending a professional event outside our country. This experience allowed us to have a glimpse on how top AI companies and professionals are using neural networks and technology to deliver continuous innovation with truly valuable solutions. We found the event organization to be excellent, with first class speakers,and really high quality content. We are really motivated and look forward to further advance our career in AI to develop solutions that help the world become a better place. Our only complaint was the cold weather we endured in Austin, it was 3 degree Celsius !!! We were seriously freezing our asses off.
Seriously looking forward to attending the timemachine.ai 2020.
You can check the full recap of the event at the following link:
