Features

In the June Innovations @ Research Park podcast episode, host Tanmay Shah talked to Identomat CEO Dr. David Lomiashvili about his career journey, experience at EnterpriseWorks, identity verification, and looking ahead. Dr. David Lomiashvili is the CEO of Identomat, which has created an innovative AI-powered KYC and identity verification solution that assesses if the person in front of a camera is real or an impersonator. Before his current venture, Dr. Lomiashvili had an extensive pedigree in entrepreneurship, not to mention a PhD in Astrophysics. “A new project,  a strategically important project, we are gonna be working on … is Digital Identity Wallet. It is a way to enable SSI, self-sovereign identity. It is what we see the next inflection point in the industry is gonna be, unleashing the wallet economy,” Lomiashvili said when talking about the future of Identomat and digital identity verification. The Innovations @ Research Park podcast highlights the thriving entrepreneurial and corporate innovation culture in Champaign. It is hosted by University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign alumnus Tanmay Shah. Subscribe to The Innovations @ Research Park to catch up on the latest innovations and news on Apple Podcasts,  Spotify, or your preferred podcast network. Is there something you want to know about Research Park? Do you have an idea for a guest for the show or a story we should pursue? Do you want to provide other feedback? Contact Laura Bleill (lwbleill@illinois.edu).

In the May episode of the Innovations @ Research Park podcast, host Tanmay Shah talked to NVIDIA Accelerated Big Data Platform Engineer Matt Ahrens about his career journey and the future of artificial intelligence (AI). Matt Ahrens oversees performance and tools work for the Accelerated Big Data Platforms group at NVIDIA. He’s a longtime leader in the University of Illinois Research Park community, graduating with a Bachelor’s degree in Mathematics and Computer Science in 2003 and working for Motorola and Yahoo! before transitioning to his current role at NVIDIA. Ahrens is also the co-founder and leader of the Champaign-Urbana Data Science User Group, which meets monthly at UIRP during the academic year. The podcast episode discusses using graphics processing units (GPUs) to accelerate data workflows. “A new frontier where we see accelerated computing really having a future is with big data processing,” Ahrens said, emphasizing how GPUs can make these processes more efficient. The Innovations @ Research Park podcast highlights the thriving entrepreneurial and corporate innovation culture in Champaign. It is hosted by University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign alumnus Tanmay Shah. Subscribe to The Innovations @ Research Park to catch up on the latest innovations and news on Apple Podcasts,  Spotify, or your preferred podcast network. Is there something you want to know about Research Park? Do you have an idea for a guest for the show or a story we should pursue? Do you want to provide other feedback? Contact Laura Bleill (lwbleill@illinois.edu).

In a recent episode of the Innovations @ Research Park podcast, host Tanmay Shah talked to IBRL Associate Director of Business Development Beth Conerty about bioprocessing research and how the iFAB Tech Hub is transforming the Central Illinois Economy. Dr. Beth Conerty has been serving as the Regional Innovation Officer at the Illinois Fermentation and Agriculture Biomanufacturing (iFAB) Hub since it was selected as a 2023 Tech Hub Designee by the U.S. Economic Development Administration (EDA) in October 2023. Conerty is working to apply her technical background to business by working in technology commercialization with a focus on entrepreneurship. “We are trying to invest in every step- from innovation here at the University of Illinois, and supporting the earliest-stage companies at Research Park and in EnterpriseWorks all the way up to manufacturing partners with ADM and Primient in Decatur,” said Conerty. “What’s really exciting about our lab-to-line approach is that all of those resources are available in a 51-mile radius between the University of Illinois Champaign-Urbana and in those bioprocessing behemoths in Decatur.” The Innovations @ Research Park podcast highlights the thriving entrepreneurial and corporate innovation culture in Champaign. It is hosted by University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign alumnus Tanmay Shah. Subscribe to The Innovations @ Research Park to catch up on the latest innovations and news on Apple Podcasts,  Spotify, or your preferred podcast network. Is there something you want to know about Research Park? Do you have an idea for a guest for the show or a story we should pursue? Do you want to provide other feedback? Contact Laura Bleill (lwbleill@illinois.edu).

In a recent episode of the Innovations @ Research Park podcast, Puzzle Labs Co-Founder Brad Miller talked with host Tamnay Shah about artificial intelligence, linguistics, and knowledge transfer. This is a field in which Miller sees growth in the next five years: “I think that we’re going to see…some remarkable advances in more than just language models. Language models are going to spark advances in health, in science, in technology.” Dr. Brad Miller is the Co-Founder and Chief Linguistic Officer of Puzzle Labs, a software platform that uses AI to make knowledge transfer easier.  Previously, he was the Site Director for P&G’s Smart Lab in the Research Park, and he’s also spent time traveling the world from Ecuador to India studying the impact of languages. “The Research Park has been a close friend for almost ten years now. I started as an intern working at the EnterpriseWorks incubator in 2015,” said Miller. “In that time, I realized the wealth of opportunity that the Research Park provides. I wish more companies understood just how valuable something like the University of Illinois Research Park really is…it’s a space where innovation thrives.” The Innovations @ Research Park podcast highlights the thriving entrepreneurial and corporate innovation culture in Champaign. It is hosted by University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign alumnus Tanmay Shah. Subscribe to The Innovations @ Research Park to catch up on the latest innovations and news on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, or your preferred podcast network. Is there something you want to know about Research Park? Do you have an idea for a guest for the show or a story we should pursue? Do you want to provide other feedback? Contact Laura Bleill (lwbleill@illinois.edu).