Without a doubt, one of the purposes of ICT/tech innovation is to solve real-life and practical problems. However, our problem solving capability in the Caribbean region can be greatly enhanced if we have people who possess the requisite skills and are suitably equipped. Professor Patrick Hosein, the Director of TTLAB, a research laboratory in Trinidad and Tobago, explains how TTLAB is developing practical and innovative solutions for industry, whilst also conducting internationally-recognised research.
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If you think about it, there is a spectrum for innovation. Innovation can range from doing absolutely nothing, through to degrees of capitalising on earlier developments, all the way to effectively creating something from scratch and in complex ways. In a practical sense, many of the innovative products and services that have been developed in the Caribbean region tend to fall somewhere in between the ends of the innovation spectrum. The outcomes are not necessarily original, as they might be a customisation or replica of existing products or services, but they have been built to address a very narrow and specific set of challenges. However, it also means that typically, those solutions cannot be applied to other similar (but not exact) situations.
Further, when we think of hotbeds of intense innovation, we tend to look outside the Caribbean region to, for example, Google, Apple, NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) and MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology). Without a doubt, many wonderful original and cutting edge products and designs have been produced by these entities, which have deep pockets and access to equipment and expertise, that we, here in the region, cannot begin to imagine. However, even with our small size and limited resources, rigorous and novel innovation is also occurring in our own backyard.
Staffed primarily by university undergraduates and graduates, TTLAB, a research laboratory In Trinidad and Tobago, has been solving a broad range of industry problems, whilst conducting cutting edge research. This research is being presented at international conferences and is being published in major journals, where the findings can be subject to peer review and scrutiny by experts around the world. More importantly, the principles of those published solutions can replicated and applied by others, thus facilitating broader application, and for those that are truly unique and are perceived to have longer term value, they are being patented.
Professor Patrick Hosein
Our guest is no stranger to the show. Professor Patrick Hosein is the Director of TTLAB, and is also a highly regarded educator, based at St. Augustine Campus of the University of the West Indies, in Trinidad and Tobago, where he has a presence in the Electrical Engineering, Computer Science and IT departments. In our earlier conversations with Professor Hosein, we spoke creating a more enabling environment for innovation, and about the work of the Trinidad and Tobago Network Information Centre (TTNIC), where he is the Chief Executive Officer, and which manages the .tt country level domain.
In this episode of the ICT Pulse Podcast, we are examining innovation from another angle. Through TTLAB, we wish to understand the potentially symbiotic relationship between solving practical, real-life problems for industry, and the world of academic research. So, in our conversation with Professor Hosein, we discuss TTLAB, and the connection between research, innovation and developing real-life solutions. Questions we posed included the following:
- What is TTLAB and how is it organised?
- How is TTLAB funded?
- Are specific research areas that are considered TTLAB specialty?
- How are projects or problems selected for research or for solving?
- What are some of the research areas that currently are being pursued at TTLAB?
- How does TTLAB marry problem solving for industry with conducting rigorous academic research?
- What are (or have been) some of the important factors that has made TTLAB the success it has become?
- What are some of the challenges that TTLAB currently faces?
- If we consider innovation as a spectrum, ranging from doing absolutely nothing, to being the most innovative, where one starts from scratch, is it important for us in the region to aspire to be ‘most innovative’?
- How do you ensure that TTLAB is continually pushing the innovation envelope?
We would love to hear your thoughts!
Do leave us a comment either here beneath this article, or on our Facebook or LinkedIn pages, or via Twitter, @ICTPulse
Select links
Below are links to some of the organisations and resources that either were mentioned during the episode, or otherwise, might be useful:
- Professor Patrick Hosein
- TTLAB
- TTLAB publications
- University of the West Indies (St Augustine Campus)
- Trinidad and Tobago Network Information Centre (TTNIC)
- ICT Pulse Podcast episode, ICT 039: Creating a more enabling environment for innovation in the Caribbean, with Professor Patrick Hosein
- ICT Pulse Podcast episode, ICTP 016: Pioneering the use of country-level domain names in the Caribbean, with Professor Patrick Hosein of TTNIC
- Select ICT Pulse articles on network neutrality:
Image credits: P Hosein; Dasapta Erwin Irawan (flickr)
Music credit: Ray Holman
