From January 15 to January 23 we (Professor Teemu Laine, Jungryul Seo, Joonas Westlin and Minbeom Joo) toured southern and eastern Finland on a LINC-UR funded trip to demonstrate our latest research achievements as well as to promote academic and business uses of the ManySense middleware. Specifically, we disseminated our research results at several research units including VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland, University of Eastern Finland (UEF), Haaga-Helia University of Applied Sciences (HHUAS), and Aalto University. More importantly, we worked intensively with fine folks at Ubium Oy, a company specializing in context-aware interaction solutions, to integrate our know-how into their products and to prepare for future collaboration. The rest of this post presents highlights from our journey.
January 16 – VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland (Espoo)
Senior Scientist Tatu Harviainen hosted a research seminar where researchers from VTT first presented their research on interactive technologies such as augmented reality. Then followed our presentations. Professor Teemu Laine spoke about context-aware games developed at UbiLife Lab, Joonas Westlin explained his research on the ManySense middleware, and Jungryul Seo delivered a presentation on human activity detection, step detection, and WIFI positioning. These presentations were repeated several times during the journey. After the seminar we held a demonstration session on the presented topics.
January 19-20 – Workshop with Professor Erkki Sutinen (Koli National Park)
Professor Erkki Sutinen from UEF kindly invited us for a two-day workshop at an idyllic cottage located in the Koli National Park, some 70km north from the city of Joensuu. Other participants of the workshop included Dr. Carolina Islas Sedano and Mr. Mikko Vinni from Ubium Oy and PhD candidate Eeva Nygren. During the workshop, we demonstrated our research and had lengthy conversations about current and future collaborations. Joint paper topics were also discussed. The workshop venue was ideal for creative work and networking, and we will consider holding future workshops in similar contexts.
January 21 – Seminar at University of Eastern Finland (Joensuu)
Dr. Jarkko Suhonen arranged a research seminar at the School of Computing at UEF where we delivered the same presentations that were given at VTT. Afterwards we discussed with professors, researchers and students of the host department on future collaboration possibilities. Among other things we talked about sending UbiLife Lab’s students to UEF as visiting researchers.
January 21 – Visit at Ubium Oy headquarters (Joensuu)
The primary purpose of this journey was to work together with Ubium Oy to facilicate the use of ManySense in a business environment. Hence, UbiLife Lab’s researchers worked long hours with Ubium’s Dr. Islas Sedano and Mr. Vinni to teach them how ManySense can be used and customized. Furthermore, we discussed future context-aware computing research areas from a business perspective. At the end of the day we enjoyed an exquisite dinner with our colleagues at Ubium as well as some other friends.
January 22 – Seminar at Haaga-Helia University of Applied Sciences (Helsinki)
Senior Lecturer Amir Dirin orgnanized a research seminar where we presented our research and study opportunities at Ajou University to a group of staff and students of HHUAS. We also met Mr. Jarmo Peltonen who is the Director of the Business IT program at HHUAS. After the seminar we provided guidance and ideas to students who were interested in developing context-aware applications.
January 23 – Visiting Professor Marko Nieminen at Aalto University (Espoo)
Professor Marko Nieminen invited Professor Laine and Amir Dirin (from HHUAS) to discuss about future collaboration on developing context-aware technology in a hospital environment. Other potential topics were also covered. Finally, we had a lunch together before we headed to the Helsinki-Vantaa Airport to conclude this eventful journey.