Libertas wins DataBusiness Challenge competition

The DataBusiness Challenge, arranged under the Six Cities Strategy gathered a total of 42 entries involving the use of public Open Data to tackle problems of modern cities. The winners were publicly announced at the Awards Gala on 15th of February – the biggest open data event this spring. The winning team, comprising of current Aalto doctoral candidates, Vincent Kuo from the School of Engineering and Jussi Nykänen from the School of Business, and Aalto alumnus Tapio Auvinen from the School of Science, cleared the table with the award for the most innovative digital solution, as well as the idea with the best business potential with their prototype solution, Libertas.

The winning trio: Jussi Nykänen (left), Vincent Kuo (centre), Tapio Auvinen (right). Picture: Mediaporras Oy, CC BY 4.0

"We are proud to share this humbling experience in honor of Aalto University, where art and technology meet science and business!" declares team member Vincent profoundly.

Indeed the tripartite, comprising of three different schools of Aalto University joining forces to tackle the challenge, is a testament to the collaborative potential to achieving something tangible.

"This is a very small, yet encouraging, step forward for us as we start to probe pilots with the relevant public entities like cities, TE Services and the Centre for Economic Development, Transport and the Environment", explains team member Jussi Nykänen.

Innovative interplay with Libertas

The prototype interface allows the user to search for and match job-seekers, job-vacancies and related training programs in one action, sided by an interactive semantic map.

The novelty in Libertas represents the shift from artificial intelligence to augmented intelligence. Instead of replacing the human, Libertas enhances existing human value creation. The Libertas workflow aligns technological advances towards solving a socio-economic problem of unemployment, with the promise of extended use-cases in facilitating innovation ecosystems.

A judge applauded Libertas as a very intelligent tool which is hoped to have a bright future although it was advised to find dedicated collaborators materialize its potential. Other judges commended the ambition level of Libertas and could see a wide range of potential use cases in a domain that will certainly excite in the future.

Since the Award Gala, the team have been in discussions with City of Vantaa Open Data Innovation Partnership Facilitator, Lari Aho.

"We want to elevate public entities as platforms facilitating the interplay of open data, digitalization and public social capital. It's a bit spooky how our visions connect", says Aho.

The pilot plan is to enhance additional public entities, through open data endeavors, towards digitally-augmented platforms for mitigating socio-economic issues, such as unemployment and beyond.

More information:

Jussi Nykänen
tel. +358 50 371 3485
[email protected]

Vincent Kuo
[email protected]
tel. +358 44 954 1094