CSIR Meraka Institute
Strategic and operational plan
Marlien Herselman
17 May 2011
Presentation Outline
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Some relevant problems
•
Meraka vision
•
Meraka Value proposition
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Macro structure
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Meraka's research competencies and
cyberinfrastructure initiatives to enable our vision
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Strategy for securing R&D contract income
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Key challenges and priorities in the functional
domains
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Budget
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Other strategic issues
Slide 2 of 21
Some relevant problems
• Poverty
– Income gap – 1.2 billion people (388 million in Africa) live on less than $1 a day
– Lack of assets – low productivity, missed opportunities, weak health and low
level of skills
– Vulnerability – external shocks, internal conflicts
– Powerlessness – no voice nor bargaining power
• Universal primary education
– In Africa, 32 million out of school, 59% will never enrol
• Functional Illiteracy
– 38% of the adult population in sub-Saharan Africa, or 153 million adults, lack the
basic literacy and numeracy skills needed in everyday life
• Access to knowledge
– 51% of South African households own no leisure books
– 7% of public schools in South Africa have functional libraries of any kind
• Cost of communication
– Europeans spend little more than 1% of their average monthly income
on mobile communication, Africans spend 17.7%
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Barriers to inclusion
– 650 million persons with disabilities - Ban Ki-moon
Slide 3 of 21
It is our belief that one of the
greatest opportunities is
to leverage the human potential and
creativity of African people
through sustainable development
towards an information society
VISION
Our vision is that Meraka will be recognised for the
contribution that its research, development and
innovation (R,D&I) in information and
communications technology (ICT) and
cyberinfrastructure has made in accelerating South
Africa's development towards an information
society, where everyone can create, access, utilise
and share information and knowledge to their
individual and collective benefit..
Slide 6 of 21
Value Proposition
Meraka strives to contribute to South Africa’s development towards an
advanced information society by addressing key issues with broad
societal impact through ICT, viz:
• Enabling ICT readiness – by focusing on extending both
infrastructure and access through researching, developing,
demonstrating and building broadband infrastructures, and on
ensuring inclusive access
• Promoting ICT use - through R&D and innovation that increases
ICT intensity and pervasiveness in society
• Contributing to ICT capabilities and skills – by enabling advanced
human capital development
Slide 7 of 21
Meraka achieves its value proposition through:
• Its ability to undertake multi-disciplinary projects
• A strong and growing profile as the foremost ICT R,D&I
institution in Africa, with competence in the following areas:
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integrative systems, platforms and technologies
wireless networking and media
human language technologies
knowledge engineering and representation
earth observation science
• Its expertise in building national cyberinfrastructure
• Extensive networks and strategic partnerships
Slide 8 of 21
Competence Areas, Research Groups and Cross-cutting Initiatives
Networks and
Media
Earth
Observation
Science and
Information
Technology
Human language
technologies
&
Knowledge
technologies
Cyberinfrastructure
Integrative
systems,
platforms and
technologies
Centre for High
Performance
Computing
Next
Generation
Integrative
ICTPlatforms
and Mobile
Architectures
and technologies
Real-Time
Video Coding
ICT for Earth
Observation
Speech
technologies
SANReN
Internet of Things
Living Labs
Engineering
Group
Wireless Mesh
Networks
Remote Sensing
Research
Speech
Applications
Very Large Scale
databases
Trusted Network
Infrastructures and
Platforms
SAGrid
Living Labs and
methodologies
(including Crime
Prevention)
ICT for Service delivery
ICT for Rural development
Education/Mobile learning
Slide 9 of 21
ICT for Health
Advanced Sensor
Networks
(emerging area)
Knowledge
Representation &
Reasoning
Enterprise
Knowledge
Engineering and
Management
Networks and Media
Research group priorities
• Wireless Mesh Networks – Strengthen cognitive radio and
spectrum management capacity with WITS and Georgia Institute
of Technology
• Real time video coding - Commercialisation and second round
funding for the ARTIST project
• Advanced Sensor Networks – Smartgrid and mining
applications in collaboration with University of Pretoria, Georgia
Institute of Technology and other CSIR units
Competence area level initiatives
• Further the relationships with Global Research Alliance Institutes
1) Fraunhofer HHI - joint research on P2P media protocol and low
rate extensions to the international H.263 video coding standard
for developing countries
2) Fraunhofer FOKUS, VTT and TNO joint research in converged
Infrastructure for Emerging Regions.
• Further relationship with Wireless World Research Forum and
IEEE Communications society through leading the work groups in
Wireless technologies for emerging regions.
Slide 10 of 21
Earth Observation Science and IT
Research group priorities
• Remote Sensing Research
• DST Earth Observation application development project
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Comparison of 4 different local and global Fire Danger models, driven by
weather forecast data by comparing it to satellite-based active fire detection
and burned area as retrospective proxy for fire probability
Satellite-derived vegetation greenness data incorporation in local models
(e.g. Lowveld model) to indicate vegetation curing and fuel moisture, to
improve Fire Danger predictions.
Implement “AFIS field units” in SADC with real-time active fire
and fire danger service as part of EC-funded African Monitoring
of Environment for Sustainable Development (AMESD) project.
• ICT4EO
• Develop scientific workflow environment for integrating Sensor
Web services for earth observation data and products with
health data
• Demonstrate scientific workflows for modelling environmental
factors that influence the incidence of cholera on EC FP7
project: Earth Observation for the mitigation of health risks
(www.eo2heaven.org)
Competence area level initiatives
• Participate in the establishment of the CSIR Space Forum
• Continued collaboration with NRE and other CSIR units in
context of Natural Environment RIA
Slide 11 of 21
Human Language and Knowledge Technologies
Human Language Technologies
• Speech technologies for multilingual, telephone-based
information service for DBE
• Automatic speech recognition systems with speakerindependent accuracies > 50% for vocabularies of 100-200
words
• Demonstrably more natural-sounding text-to-speech systems
incorporating natural language processing
• Broadband data repository for 11 official languages
• Work with Google on languages outside 40 priority languages
Enterprise Knowledge Engineering and Management
• Enterprise engineering platform for health care delivery, in
collaboration with Built Environment and Biosciences
• Adapt everyday communication technologies (e.g. low-end
mobile phones) to capture indigenous knowledge in
collaboration with NMMU
Slide 12 of 21
Knowledge Representation & Reasoning
• Centre for Artificial Intelligence with UKZN
• Collaboration with UKZN, NRE and SANBI on Biodiversity
Information Management System
Integrative systems, platforms & technologies
Build new research groups
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Next Generation ICT and Mobile Architectures
Dependable scalable robust future proof architectures and solutions to
enable an inclusive information society
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Internet of Things Engineering Group
Large scale, smart/optimal solutions in the Cloud which integrates
physical objects (“smart devices”, sensors and tags) with the Internet.
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Trusted Network Infrastructures and Platforms
Network infrastructures with built-in security, dependability and privacy to
support complex distributed systems and transactions.
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Living Labs and methodologies
User driven innovation and real world validation of technology
Competence area level initiatives
Slide 13 of 21
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Indigenous Knowledge Systems treasure hub for communal socioeconomic development with DST
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Establish mobile applications laboratory in collaboration with Innovation
hub supported by Infodev, DST and Nokia
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Converged (IP, Voice & Mobile) Communication Mobile Platform (e.g For
Presidential Hotline)
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Tshwane Smart City - linking sensors, networks, data and processing
Centre for High Performance Computing
(CHPC) and Very Large Scale databases
Centre for High Performance Computing
• Extension of phase 2 machine (SUN M6000) to at least 80 to
100 teraflop – currently running at 80% capacity – aim to get
back in TOP500
• Expand number of user from 500 by about 20% targeting
mainly non-traditional users
• Consolidation of industrial users forum
• Commission GPGPU cluster as test-bed preparing of phase
3 machine / 2nd node (2012)
• Results from flagships coming for instance cardiovascular
simulation, astronomy
Very Large Scale databases
• Implement phase 1 of VLDB minimum of 1 petabyte storage
• SAEON, HSRC, National Heritage Council
through national library as lead users
Slide 14 of 21
SANReN Governance
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SANReN Advisory Forum
Cyberinfrastructure structure
Metro rings
Complete metro rings in
Tshwane, Ethekwini & Cape
Town - adding 85 sites to
SANReN
SKA Support
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Ensure on time completion
of Cape Town to SALT and
Meerkat SANReN link: vital
for South Africa's SKA bid
Extending the backbone
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Evaluation of 7 RFPs for
connectivity to remote and
disadvantaged institutions,
contract and expedite
roll-out
Slide 15 of 21
Securing R&D contract income
• Government Sector - support strategic partners and explore contract
R&D opportunities
– Top strategic partners: DST, DoC, DAC, DoH, USAASA, SITA, DBE,
COGTA, DRDLR, DTI, ICASA
• African continent - increase partnerships for capacity building, HCD and
research by aligning with CSIR and DST initiatives and prioritised
countries, and by exploring new contract R&D opportunities
– Explore donor/funding agency and AU opportunities for coordination,
networking, research and HCD as well as contract R&D funding
– CSIR ICT Flagship with Meraka playing a leading role, supporting
major initiatives, including South Africa’s SKA bid
Securing R&D contract income
• International - diversify international collaboration and increase
collaborative R&D and HCD
– Donors, foundations and multilateral agencies
– Bilateral agreements as framework with a focus on the EU and
emerging markets in Asia and South America
– Competitive R&D through especially the EU FP7 calls for proposals.
• Industry / Private sector- To grow and diversify sales to industry by seeking
R&D partnerships and contracts, and by aligning with government’s priority
to increase competitiveness through innovation
– Initial focus is on the ICT and telecoms sectors, including mobile, fixedline and Internet service providers
– Long haul model
Slide 17 of 21
Key challenges and priorities in the
functional domains
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HR/HCD
Transformation
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Leadership
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Pipeline
Leadership development for newly appointed CAMs, RGLs
and other managers
Strategic research management
Meraka Research Strategy
ICT R&D and Innovation strategy implementation roadmap
Meraka alignment to and participation in CSIR RIAs
Outcomes / Technology Transfer
Securing and protecting of intellectual assets
Building a patent portfolio
Increasing commercial licensing of technology – short-term
focus on real-time video coding IP cluster / ARTIST project
Other Strategic Issues
• Marginal and emerging research groups
– “Stage gate” maturity process
• Cyberinfrastructure structure
– Working document with discussion of key issues
and options developed (Wright, Cloete & Sithole)
– Refinement through discussions with international
groups (Netherlands, Finland, Norway)
– Next step: discussion with CSIR Executive & DST
• Funding / Business model
– Competence area leadership
– Articulate and package offerings
– Optimise ratio between R&D capacity and
management and support overhead
Slide 19 of 21
Thank you!