Stellar speaker list grows for MIT’s EmTech Singapore conference

By Digital News Asia October 31, 2014

Leading augmented reality expert to present
Not Impossible Labs project to be showcased

Stellar speaker list grows for MIT’s EmTech Singapore conference

MIT’s EmTech Singapore 2015 conference, organised by the world’s oldest tech publication MIT Technology Review, is picking up steam with more speakers joining an already stellar list.

The conference is expected to bring together over 500 business leaders, innovators, entrepreneurs, and change-makers who are passionate about turning ideas into solutions and addressing major global issues.

It is an opportunity to glimpse the future and begin to understand the technologies that matter and how they will change the face of business and drive the new global economy, the organiser said. It is where technology, business, and culture converge, and also a showcase for emerging technologies with the greatest potential to change our lives.

Themed ‘Inspire, Connect and Innovate,’ the second annual EmTech Singapore conference will be held from Jan 27-28, 2015, at the Marina Bay Sands, Singapore.

Among the most recent executives added to the roster is renowned machine learning expert Dr Kai Yu, deputy director of the Institute of Deep Learning (IDL) at Baidu.

Joining him is Ramesh Raskar, associate professor at MIT Media Lab, whose research interests span the fields of computational photography, inverse problems in imaging, and human-computer interaction.

Then there is Steven Feiner, one of the world’s leading augmented reality (AR) experts. A professor of Computer Science at Columbia University, he directs the Computer Graphics and User Interfaces Lab, and co-directs the Columbia Vision and Graphics Centre.

Feiner’s lab has been doing AR research for over 20 years, creating the first outdoor mobile AR system using a see-through display, and pioneering experimental applications of AR to fields such as tourism, journalism, maintenance, and construction.

Stellar speaker list grows for MIT’s EmTech Singapore conference Among the many other inspiring leaders who will be speaking at the two-day event is David Putrino (pic) of Not Impossible Labs which holds to the concept of Help One, Help Many.’

Describing how it works, Putrino says, “Our process is to find a common global problem that does not have a satisfactory, scalable solution, and then pull together a team of makers and innovators to make an open-source solution that enables people to help themselves, or others in their community.

“Really pushing the concept that we can all be makers, we can all be innovators,” he adds.

Attendees at EmTech Singapore can look forward to Putrino’s presentation on the Eyewriter and Don's Voice projects.

These will show people that wherever you are living and if you have a loved one with ALS (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis) or any locked-in neurological syndrome, and cannot afford a communication device, you can purchase special hardware for US$100 online, and use freely available, open-source software to provide your loved one with an accessible, computerised communication device.

The Brainwriter Project will show people the future vision for the Eyewriter project – how things will be changing and developing to give more options to help people with communication difficulties due to neurological disease.

The work Putrino will present at EmTech Singapore 2015 is highly relevant to anyone. Not Impossible Labs is striving to show people that they have the power to take their solutions and use them to help themselves, or someone in their community.

Similarly, they encourage people to take their solutions (which are by no means perfect) and improve upon them to help more people in the community.

Combining technologies from different industries towards a common goal, Putrino truly embodies the EmTech spirit, MIT Technology Review said.

A physiotherapist with a PhD in neuroscience, Putrino has worked as a clinician in Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States. He studied computational neuroscience at Harvard Medical School and MIT, and designed prostheses for Brain Machine Interface devices at NYU.

He is also cofounder and the chief medical officer of GesTherapy, a tele-rehabilitation software company that works to improve the standard of care patients who require rehabilitation. He also volunteers for Not Impossible Labs and is currently leading or contributing to multiple Not Impossible projects, including the Brainwriter.

To enjoy an early bird rate for EmTech Singapore, register before Nov 7. Digital News Asia (DNA) is a media partner for the event.

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