Avanade supports UCL Computer Science with tech for good projects

A joint venture between Microsoft and the consulting business Accenture, Avanade helps organisations innovate with technology. Avanade has worked with UCL Computer Science for several years, mentoring students on the UCL Industry Exchange Network (UCL IXN). UCL IXN provides students with real-world challenges to solve as part of their courses.

The students build working prototypes to test their ideas while being supported by technology firms, such as Avanade and Microsoft.

The visit began with Aaron explaining his role leading Avanade's global R&D strategy and incubating emerging technologies. He remarked that while artificial intelligence has been developed over the last 60 years, the public has only used the new transformer models for two years.

There are many improvements to make, though AI models will always be imperfect. UCL and Avanade discussed the importance of questioning the results from generative AI and how education fosters critical thinking. 

UCL and Avanade share a commitment to using technology for the good of society. The students use the UCL Tech for Good Lab, a leading lab for AI PC, offline AI and cloud AI in an education institution.

The department revealed how its researchers are advising the UN and UNESCO on prejudice against women in large language models. The department also highlighted its action plan to attract more women and racial diversity into computing.

UCL Computer Science is the first UK university computer science department to have received an Athena Swan Gold award, recognising its excellence in advancing gender equality.  

Second-year undergraduate and Vice President of the UCL AI Society, Asmita Anand, co-hosted the event and opened the presentations. Five student teams showed their project progress to the Avanade team of Aaron; Fergus Kidd, R&D Engineering Lead at Avanade; Martin Harper, UKI Innovation Lead; and Kirsty Christie, Group Manager of Corporate Citizenship.

The projects ranged from a tool to encourage software development best practices to an AI chatbot for people with dementia. There was also an offline AI voice assistant for individuals with motor neurone disease, and solutions to improve accessibility for booking systems and shared computers.   

Commenting on the visit, Aaron said: "I was amazed to see how the students have taken AI and embedded it directly into their 'tech for good' projects they are working on with Avanade. Our partnership with UCL Computer Science was started several years ago and the energy and ideas from the students always bring us fresh perspectives. At Avanade, we welcome diverse insights and backgrounds that help drive open innovation."