This document discusses Science Foundation Ireland (SFI), a statutory body that funds research in Ireland. It outlines SFI's budget and core funding areas of ICT, life sciences, and energy. It then explores how technological platforms like processing, storage, displays, and sensors have advanced exponentially, enabling new applications and innovations at their integration points. Analyzing the growing data from these technologies is increasingly challenging.

1. Innovation, Marketing and New
Technology Foresight
Dr. Stephen Flinter, Science Foundation Ireland
Research for Ireland’s Future

3. About SFI
 Founded in 2000
 Statutory body in 2003
 Annual budget €161m (2011), €156m (2012)
 Three core areas:
 ICT
 Life Sciences
 Energy

4. SFI Programmes
 Research Frontiers (>500 awards)
 €50k-€150k (p.a.)
 Principal Investigator (>100 awards)
 €150-€500k (p.a.)
 Strategic Research Cluster (19 awards)
 €1m-€1.5m (p.a.)
 Centres for Science Engineering and Technology (9
awards)
 €2m-€3.5m (p.a.)

5. SFI Process
 Open calls
 Investigator-driven
 Bottom-up selection
 Expert, international peer review panels

7. Watt’s Steam Engine (1775)

8. Stephenson’s Rocket
(1829)

9. Bell’s Telephone (1876)

10. Edison’s Light Bulb (1878)

11. Benz’s Internal Combustion
Engine (1896)

12. Marconi’s Transatlantic
Transmission (1901)

13. Broadcast Television (1936)

14. Powered Flight (1903)

15. Supersonic Flight (1947)

16. Space Flight (1957)

17. Commercial Supersonic
(1969)

18. Commercial Bulk Carriers
(1969)

19. Apollo 11 – Moon Landing
(1969)

20. Low Cost Airlines (1985-)

22. Platform Technologies
 Processing
 Storage
 Display
 Communications
 Sensing

23. Moore’s Law
 The number of transistors on an integrated circuit
doubles every 2 years
 The processor speed doubles every 18 months

24. Moore’s Law

25. Clock Speed

26. Multicore Processors
Intel Core i7 Processor

27. Storage

28. Reducing Cost of Storage
http://www.mkomo.com/cost-per-gigabyte

29. Samsung EcoGreen F2
HD103SI 1TB (2009)
 1TB capacity
 €69

30. Samsung Spinpoint F4EG –
2TB (2010)
 2TB capacity
 €89.95

31. Samsung Spinpoint F4EG –
2TB (2011)
 2TB capacity
 €179.95

32. Flash Memory

33. iPod
 Introduced October
2001
 5 & 10 GB capacities

34. iPod Touch
 Introduced September
2007
 8, 32, 64GB

35. The Innovator’s Dilemma
 Clayton M. Christensen
(2000)

36. Displays: from CRT to LCD

37. Touch Sensitive Displays

38. Electronic Paper
Amazon Kindle 3 Sony Prototype Flexible EPD

39. Guesture-based Interaction

40. Communications
 7.2mbps wireless (HSDPA)
 ~7mbps (WiMAX)
 20mbps wired broadband
 75-300mbps wireless (3G LTE)
 100mbps WiFi (802.11n)
 100-1000mbps wireless (4G)
 1000mbps LAN

41. Photonics
 Used to support
backbone networks
 40 gbps – 1.5 tbps

42. Cognative Radio
 Ultra wide band
 Multiple frequencies
 Software defined radio

43. Positional Sensors
GPS Sensor In-car Sat Nav

44. Chemical/Environmental
Sensors
Microfluidics array & phosphate sensor package – NCSR & Clarity CSET

45. Home/Building Sensors

46. Body Sensors
An Post cycle team at being fitted with Foster Miller sensor vest (Clarity Centre)

48. Internet & World Wide Web
Web 1.0 Web 2.0
Pre-92 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009

49. Web 3.0 – Semantic Web
 Ascribing meaning to
data
 Linked Data
 Connecting disparate
data sources
DERI sig.ma semantic search engine

50. Internet of Things
 Billions or even trillions
of connected devices
 Both wired & wireless
 Sensor web & semantic
web

51. Assisted Living
 Using sensor web to
monitor well being
 Fall detection
 Variations in daily
routine

52. Medical Devices
 Advanced signal
processing
 Real-time data analysis
 Connected devices
Neonatal brain monitoring at UCC

53. Location Awareness
 Mobile devices
 Multiple sensors
 Layer additional
information based on
location
Layar augmented reality

54. Data Analytics
 Measuring your
website
 …personal finances
 …business
 …warehouse
 …retail centre
 …

55. Data Mining & Visualisation
 Enormous growth in
volume of data
 Growing need to
analyse and visualise
data
Data visualisation – SFI Clique SRC

56. Conclusions
 Platform technologies continue to develop at
exponential pace
 New applications emerging to exploit platform
technologies
 Innovation happening at the integration points
 Analyzing the data becoming increasingly harder
 Sensor-based technologies next big thing

57. Contact
stephen.flinter@sfi.ie
@sflinter (Twitter)
http://flinter.com/contact