Julie Spillane Accenture Ireland’s Innovation Centre director, using AI to achieve innovative solutions.

By @SimonCocking

Great exclusive interview with Julie Spillane, director of Accenture Centre for Innovation in Dublin.

Your background briefly?

I am the director of the Accenture Centre for Innovation in Dublin. A member of the Accenture Ireland Leadership Team,  I previously worked in several technology companies including Microsoft and Epicor.  I graduated in Electronic Engineering from the National University of Ireland, Galway, and am also a Fellow of the Chartered Association of Certified Accountants (FCCA). With a long standing commitment to driving growth and innovation in Ireland, I founded and chaired the Multinational Technology Forum. I’m a passionate advocate for STEM skills and was recently appointed to the Department of Education and Skills’ Steering Group to develop a new national skills strategy.

What is your role?

To lead the Centre for Innovation in Dublin, a hub of new thinking aimed at solving real-life problems. The future, particularly in the digital world is all about cross-industry collaboration, I will oversee Accenture’s work with pioneering clients and other organisations to research, incubate and pilot new technology solutions to drive digital and organisational transformation.  Initially, the areas of focus are artificial intelligence, analytics, life sciences, strategy and digital marketing.

What’s the goal for Accenture in developing the Centre for Innovation?

The Centre for Innovation is a multidisciplinary research and incubation centre that will develop solutions to some of society’s biggest issues.   Industry convergence will play a significant role – specifically applying best practice from one industry to others and using these cross-industry insights to co-create with clients and help them design their future. A key part of the Centre’s work will be collaboration with universities, research houses, industry leaders and start-ups on projects that are changing the face of business and technology. We believe that this cross-sector approach to research and innovation could lead to the development of ground-breaking solutions.

Where will it be located? / what is the time scale?

The Centre is open today and in late 2016, will be re-located to our long-term home in the heart of Dublin’s Silicon Docks, at 7 Hanover Quay.  The state of the art research facility will be custom-designed to foster creativity and innovation. We are recruiting for approximately 200 roles at the moment and projects are already underway.

Is there a particular type of innovation you’d like to see emerge?

The exciting thing about the Centre for Innovation is the focus on industry convergence and collaboration and the discovery of the unknown. Industries are converging at a huge rate – for example, supermarkets are now banks and mobile phone operators and areas like analytics and artificial intelligence are opening up even more opportunities.  We’re creating a Centre for Innovation where experts with skills in design thinking and development are brought together with industry experts in areas like Life Sciences, Analytics, Digital Marketing and Artificial Intelligence, among others, to develop and pilot new ideas.

What trends are you excited about looking forwards?

Areas like artificial intelligence, big data and digital are coming together to change our worlds for the better.  This will be characterised by exponential innovation and exponential potential driven in large part by Artificial Intelligence technologies coming of age.  We believe AI will usher in the next huge wave of disruption through exponential increases in artificial intelligence, completely reimagining how we work, communicate and live.  One of the areas Accenture globally is working on is with a company in the Life Sciences space to help improve drug safety.  There’s a vast quantity of complex data that needs to be analysed at speed. We’re using AI technologies, such as machine-based learning, coupled with natural language processing to reduce the time qualified physicians spend reviewing cases. What used to take 4-5 hours now takes just 8-10 minutes, so skilled medical professionals free up time to treat more patients and costs have been significantly reduced.

Where does Accenture hope to be in 5 – 10 years time?

It’s hard to see forward even 3 years given the pace of technology is developing so fast and digital is disrupting almost every industry and sector – so to fast forward 5-10 years is almost impossible.  This year marked a significant milestone for Accenture in Ireland with the establishment of the Centre for Innovation in Dublin’s Silicon Docks, and we believe that this area can become Ireland’s breeding ground for the best innovation, a catalyst for the best thinking and a magnet for the best talent.  This is why as a company, we are committed to innovating in analytics, artificial intelligence, big data, and design thinking within areas including Life Sciences, Public Safety and digital marketing.

We foresee huge growth in cross industry disruption and the application of emerging technologies such as machine learning and advanced analytics. In order to support our clients through the transformation this will bring we need to invest further in research and development now.

Work / life, on line / offline, IoT can make us more connected, talk us through the potential pros and cons of this?

The key thing is that technology can be used to make life easier, better and safer.  Artificial Intelligence is going to be only one way we will be able to handle the scope and complexity of the business and societal challenges of the next generation. Fundamentally, Artificial Intelligence will be about Making Humans Super NOT Making Super Humans.  This means you have to take a People First mindset.  Enterprises must focus on enabling people – consumers, employees and ecosystem partners –to accomplish more with technology. They will have to create a corporate culture that harnesses digital to enable people to constantly adapt, learn, continuously create new solutions, drive relentless change, and disrupt the status quo.  In an age where the focus is locked on technology, the true leaders will, in fact, place people first.   It’s time to relook at your workforce – what tasks should humans do, what skills do they need now –for example robotics engineers – and how they are going to work with machines from intelligent agents to robots and more.

Anything else to add/ we should have asked?

We are now hiring 200 professionals, including developers as well as industry experts and designers with expertise in analytics, life sciences, digital marketing, artificial intelligence, public safety and strategy.  Interested candidates can register their interest at www.accenture.com/innovationdublin

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