Software Engineering in Research: Lessons Learned Doing AI Research in Africa
Sekou Lionel Remy
Goals and objectives
IBM Research Africa was founded in 2013, and in its first 10 years has had the opportunity to grow an exciting research footprint. The lab’s physical base is in Kenya and South Africa, but over the years it has done work in 11 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa while also contributing to a global research effort in terms of both projects and Intellectual Property. As Africa’s first Corporate Research Lab, in the early days there were several exploratory research areas considered as the lab balanced the needs of sustainable science and societal impact, but through our evolution and growth one area that has remained is Healthcare. In this talk, I will to share some key takeaways from some of our Healthcare work, and present a look forward at some of the opportunities in research software engineering in Africa and the Middle East.