Feb 17 2016

Interview: Thierry Priol reviews 2015 and tell us what to expect from Inria@SiliconValley in 2016!

Thierry Priol © INRIA / Photo M. Bourguet

Thierry Priol
© INRIA / Photo M. Bourguet

Thierry Priol, Inria’s Director of European & International Partnerships (DPEI) tells us about Inria@SiliconValley program’s 2015 highlights and what to look forward to in 2016.
  • Thierry, can you tell us about the highlights of 2015 regarding the Inria@SiliconValley program?

TP: 2015 was a fruitful year for Inria’s collaboration with California partners! With 15 joint research projects through the “Associate Team” program, the exchange of researchers (sabbatical, short visits, internships), the welcoming of International Chairs, and the launching of news initiatives such as the Initiative on Smart Cities, 2015 reflected the dynamism of the Inria@SiliconValley program.

The annual BIS workshop (BIS’2015) organized with CITRIS on Berkeley Campus was a success, gathering more than 100 scientists (French and US) over 3 days.  Part of the workshop aimed at enlightening joint results of the collaboration, another part was devoted to elaborating future goals. Interaction between associate teams took place during Parallel Working Sessions on Neuroimaging, Scientific Computing, and Smart City. BIS’2015 also featured an open conference co-organized with CITRIS and  EIT ICT Labs, on the subject of  ‘Who Owns the Data?” that brought together data scientists, entrepreneurs, and representatives of public agencies, advocacy organizations, and the private sector from the United States and Europe.

Capitalizing on the organization of BIS in the Bay Area, Inria (through its Paris Research Center) organized in San Francisco with PRIME the first “Inria Industry Meeting” ever held outside France, on the theme of Smart City & Mobility Innovations, offering the possibility to create business opportunities between Inria research teams/startups and American companies.

Also on the Transfer & Innovation part, the Inria start-up XtremeLogic was selected in the framework of the 2015 NETVA program,  receiving both entrepreneurial training and practice during a week long immersion in the United States, and 3 Inria spin-off (Axellience, CryptoSense and Vulog) were selected through the Inria-PRIME&French Tech Hub partnership to be coached to launch onto the US market.

  • Did you do any specific actions regarding the program?

TP: In order to enhance the animation of the community around Inria@SiliconValley, a special focus was made on communication. The Inria@SiliconValley team (Valerie Issarny as scientific coordinator in California and Tania Castro as program coordinator in France) made a great effort on conceiving a monthly Newsletter, published on the website and to which any person interested in the program can subscribe to.  We are celebrating the first year of the Newsletter that was launched in February 2015 and this tool is very appreciated by the Inria@SiliconValley community that can advertise their news such as workshops, awards, scientific breakthrough, or funding opportunities in France and California.

In 2015 was also created the  “Inria@SIliconvalley HAL collection“, allowing the joint research teams involved to have their co-publications available on HAL (open publication archive) tagged as part of the collaboration and displayed automatically on the dedicated web page (https://project.inria.fr/siliconvalley/research/publications/).

  • Also  Inria@SiliconValley celebrated in 2015 its 4 year of existence which is a stepping stone for an Inria International initiative! 

TP: Yes! In 2015, after 4 years of activity, it was time to assess the outcome of the collaboration before going on and deciding next objectives. In that regard we produced an Activity Report, that can be dowloaded in our website, to review the various activities and outcomes of Inria@SiliconValley from 2011 to 2014, and also to introduce the plan for the next four years. Since its creation back in 2011, Inria@SiliconValley has been expanding its research collaborations from the Bay area to California at large, and further developing partnerships and joint projects combining Research and Innovation.

  • What can we expect in 2016?

TP: As part of the 2016 call for Associate Team program, we will maintain in 2016 a total of 15 on-going joint research projects with California universities, including the creation of  4 new joint projects and the renewal of one project for 3 more years (see news here).

BIS’2016 will take place in Paris in June 8th -10th in the brand new Inria Research Center of Paris, with an open conference to be held in the framework of the Futur en Seine digital festival, which is very exciting.

We will continue our tight and fruitful partnership with the CITRIS and strengthen our collaboration with California universities, fostering new cooperations, in particular with Southern California. The program also aims to encourage Transfer & Innovation with the support of the French Embassy in the US, and also the implication in EU initiatives such as the transatlantic activities toward smarter inclusive cities launched in January with the support of EIT Digital.

Needless to say that we are looking forward to 2016!

Interview by Tania Castro, European and International Partnerships Department