With cascading disruption and decentralization in the blockchain space the order of the day, IOHK, a leading blockchain research and development company, and the University of Edinburgh are to invest between $500,000 and $1 million (m) a year in the project located within the School of Informatics at the Scottish institution that was founded in 1582.
Going forward there are plans for more such centres to be opened this year and into 2018, including ones slated for Greece and the United States.
The signing of the partnership deal between IOHK, an engineering company that builds cryptocurrencies and blockchains for academic institutions, corporations and governments, and the Scottish university to establish the institution’s first blockchain centre to boost research into cryptocurrencies and solve business problems around blockchain technology, follows a recent partnership struck less than two weeks ago with the Tokyo Institute of Technology, Japan’s leading technology university.
It also comes after the School of Informatics, one of seven schools in the College of Science and Engineering at Edinburgh and one of the largest in Europe, won a share of £350m (c.$437m) investment in UK science and engineering postgraduate training in 2013. This enabled it to host two Centres of Doctoral Training and co-host a further centre with Heriot-Watt University, a public university in Edinburgh established in 1821 and the world’s first mechanics’ institute.
Edinburgh University, as the sixth oldest university in the English-speaking world, has been associated over the years through its alumni and academic staff, with some of the most significant scientific contributions in human history.
These include laying the foundations of quantum mechanics (Max Born), the theory of evolution (Charles Darwin), invention of the telephone (Alexander Graham Bell) as well as the classical theory of electromagnetism (James Clerk Maxwell) to name a few amongst the notables.
(Image: Shutterstock).
Start-Ups Spin-Outs
As well as attracting investment into the School, which offers undergraduate and postgraduate degree courses in Informatics, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Cognitive Science, Computational Science and Software Engineering, the facility has encouraged over 60 start-ups and spin-outs over the past seven years.
IOHK, which was founded by Charles Hoskinson and Jeremy Wood in 2015 and initially incorporated in Hong Kong, is “committed to using peer-to-peer innovations to 3 billion or so people who don’t have them” according to a blurb on their website.
Over the past two years IOHK has grown and is today dispersed around the globe. In addition to a key office in Japan, there are a number of people involved with the organization based in London and other parts of Europe as well as in Russia, South America, the US and China. Over the next 12-24 months it is understood that the company will be expanding beyond these territories.
Blockchain Tech Lab’s Roadmap
While the investment in the Blockchain Technology Laboratory is to be split between the university and IOHK, the majority is of being funded by the engineering company. The centre will be lead by Professor Aggelos Kiayias, Chair in Cyber Security and Privacy at the University of Edinburgh and IOHK’s Chief Scientist, along with IOHK’s CEO Hoskinson.
The lab will be inter-disciplinary so that professors from other fields will contribute and be able to train undergraduate to post-doctoral and professor level. Ultimately the plan is to scale up, so they collaborate with a global network of academics based in IOHK’s other centres such as in Tokyo and beyond that the company has plans to open later this year and into next.
Blockchain RD
Academics and students are to be brought together to collaborate on blockchain research and development with a focus on what are described as “industry inspired problems”. In so doing talent will be nurtured in the blockchain space by having world class teaching offered by the university’s professors. There is also a desire to bring in governments for wide-ranging collaborations.
Commenting on the partnership Hoskinson said: “It will develop IOHK’s core business area, cryptocurrencies and blockchain-related technologies, and nurture and develop the global talent in these areas in the United Kingdom.”
The research lab in Scotland will also serve as the headquarters for IOHK’s growing network of global university partnerships. Illustrative of this, Tokyo Institute of Technology launched a similar centre with IOHK in mid February 2017.
As the lab’s Director, Professor Kiayias is responsible for organizing collaborations with fellow academics at the university and to oversee researchers and students from undergraduate to PhD level in a broad range of topics related to blockchain systems. Research collaborations will be interdisciplinary and will include – beyond cryptography and computer science – economics, game theory, regulation and compliance, business and law.
The lab will provide a direct connection between developers and researchers, helping to get projects live faster and aims to “pursue outreach projects” with entrepreneurs in Edinburgh’s local technology community.
Recruiting and outreach will begin immediately and the full facility will be operational from summer 2017, which will be located in the School of Informatics’ newly refurbished Appleton Tower.
Professor Kiayias speaking in the wake of the collaboration on blockchain technology between the School of Informatics and IOHK, said: “Distributed ledgers is an upcoming disruptive technology that can scale information services to a global level. The academic and industry connection forged by this collaboration puts the Blockchain Technology Lab at Edinburgh at the forefront of innovation in blockchain systems.”
IOHK indicated that it is committed to developing industry standards and best practices that progress the field of cryptography. In contrast to other industry-university partnerships, IOHK’s collaboration with Edinburgh ensures that all funded RD will be “open source and patent-free.”
Jeremy Wood, IOHK’s co-founder, claimed: “Our partnership with the University of Edinburgh provides unique opportunities for current students to become the next generation of blockchain and cryptography leaders.”
He added: “As a headquarters for IOHK’s international academic research community, we expect to see the university facilitate innovative projects that drive how businesses and governments approach blockchain and cryptocurrencies.”
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