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---
title: "Academic and Industry Experts Share Expertise During OpenPOWER and AI Workshop at Loyola Institute of Technology"
date: "2019-03-07"
categories:
- "blogs"
---
By [Dr. Sujatha Jamuna Anand](https://www.linkedin.com/in/dr-sujatha-jamuna-anand-4251ba92/), Principal, Loyola Institute of Technology
We recently held the OpenPOWER and AI training workshop in Chennai, India. In addition to faculty and students from [Loyola Institute of Technology](https://litedu.in/), we were joined by academic and industry experts from [IBM](https://www.ibm.com/us-en/?ar=1), [Open Computing Singapore](https://opencomputing.sg/), [Indian Institute of Technology Madras](https://www.iitm.ac.in/), [University of Engineering and Management Kolkata](http://uem.edu.in/uem-kolkata/) and [Object Automation](http://www.object-automation.com/).
Attendees learned from a number of sessions:
- [Ganesan Narayanasamy](https://www.linkedin.com/in/ganesannarayanasamy/), IBM shared insight on AI, deep learning inferencing and edge computing. As part of his presentation, he shared several use cases which have been deployed in multiple industries around the world.
- [Jayaram Kizhekke Pakkathillam](https://www.linkedin.com/in/jayaram-kizhekke-pakkathillam-6b2b0963/), IIT Madras gave a brief introduction about unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and the projects he’s worked on as part of IIT Madras’ Aerospace Engineering department. He also discussed how UAVs are effectively used for military and agricultural purposes with examples of different AI systems.
- [Wilson Josup](https://www.linkedin.com/in/wilson-josup-cdcp-ccca-a18ab943/), Open Computing Singapore spoke about the difference between CPUs and GPUs, different types and use cases of GPUs and how OpenPOWER architecture innovations contribute to improved performance from applications.
- [Gayathri Venkataramanan](https://www.linkedin.com/in/gayathri-venkataramanan-0a8831166/), Object Automation and [Prince Barai](https://www.linkedin.com/in/prince-pratik7/), University of Engineering and Management Kolkata delivered various AI use cases with excellent examples.
Beyond features of AI, several presentations and demonstrations answered how data-driven innovation can be brought to life, and what steps are needed to move AI out of the lab and into mainstream business.
The OpenPOWER and AI Workshop provided opportunities for young students to initiate their own AI-related projects and collaborations.