Welcome and Congratulations • We welcome you to the Taiwan AI Academy (AIA) • We congratulate you for having passed the entrance exam – I know this may not be easy for some of you, especially for those who have been out from school for some years • More importantly, I congratulate you for having earned this unique four-month study opportunityto advance yourselves in the important field of AI • This is especially significant at this time when AI has begun to change every aspect of our life and our society

1. 台灣人工智慧學校
台中分校第一期開學典禮
2018/8/16
孔祥重校長
H. T. Kung
Harvard University

2. 台中分校第一期
技術領袖班與經理人班的各位學員們
大家好！
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3. Welcome and Congratulations
• We welcome you to the Taiwan AI Academy
(AIA)
• We congratulate you for having passed the
entrance exam
– I know this may not be easy for some of you,
especially those who have been out from school for
some years
• More importantly, I congratulate you for having
earned this unique four-month study
opportunity to advance yourselves in the
important field of AI and its applications
• This is especially significant at this time when AI
has begun to change every aspect of our life and
our society
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4. Some Background About AIA
• In 2017 I took a 6-month sabbatical from Harvard
to visit Taiwan, staying mainly in Hsinchu
• To get an understanding on the potential use of
AI in Taiwan's industry, I visited about 20
companies, mostly with CEO Dr. SW Chen
• Many of these companies expressed their strong
interest in exploring the AI opportunity
• They needed a deep understanding of how AI
can help their business, but this assessment is
difficult for many of them
• We initiated Project Theta to work with a dozen
of companies, and had success with most of them
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5. A Lesson Learned:
Talent Development Is Urgent
• We need both engineers for AI systems and
applications development as well as managers
who can manage and support AI projects
• 2,000 companies in Taiwan @ 5 each -->
10,000 such people needed
• We must nurture most of them locally in
Taiwan, given the global war for AI talent and
short-term nature of the AI opportunity
• This calls for new human resource
development systems to meet talent demands
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6. Taiwan's Competitive Advantages
• Ownership of unique data in some important areas
such as manufacturing and healthcare. This means that
we have interesting data to work with
• Visionary leadership in government, industry and
academia. They understand the importance of AI and
are willing to commit resources
• Extremely efficient communication (physical and
cyber) and networking among professionals in Taiwan
• And people like you, who are willing to take extra steps
to become contributors to this new technology
opportunity for Taiwan
Thus Taiwan has an amazing readiness in capturing
the AI opportunity.
TOGETHER WE CAN DO IT!
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7. About AIA
• We are here today to celebrate the beginning of a new class in
the Taichung area. We thank 亞洲大學 for providing this
wonderful space for this event
• Sponsored by Foundations and supported by many friends, AIA
has flexible programs to meet industry's need
• We focus on real-world applications and we set up campuses in
the vicinity of major industrial centers of Taiwan such as
Taichung
• We encourage Industry to send their managers and engineers to
AIA to work on their own problems and data
• AIA students have access to high-quality study environments and
state-of-the-art computing equipment
• AIA students work together to gain hands-on experience in
solving problems of interest to industry
• It is this on-campus learning and networking experience which
differs AIA from online courses
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8. Some Advice: Set Up Your Objectives
• A four-month time is long enough to do
something substantial and also short enough
for having a realistic expectation
– Note companies often use quarterly milestones
• You should have concrete objectives for your
four months at AIA
– If you don't have them yet, work it out in the
coming week
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9. Some Example Objectives
• Learn how convolutional neural networks
works
• Learn machine learning framework skills such
as Tensor Flow, Caffe and Keras
• Do a project which you always wanted to do.
Doing it at AIA can be cost-effective for you
• Meet new friends and strengthen existing
friendship for inspiration, collaboration and
networking
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10. In December 2018,
When You Graduate from AIA, ...
• You can clearly state what you have accomplished in
the four months
• Your employers will consider highly of your experience
at AIA
• You will be one of the first in your organization and
community who will turn potential benefits of AI into
reality
• Your family will understand why you have worked hard
at AIA, and be proud of you
• You will be able to keep up with this fast moving field
on exciting topics such as edge AI, distributed AI, AI
related privacy and security solutions, and AI chips
• You will look forward to joining the AIA alumni
networks 10

11. I Wish Each and Everyone of You
Will Accomplish Something Meaningful at AIA
JUST DO IT!
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