At the Lipik Artificial Intelligence Center, ‘Technology Days’ Held

The Lipik Artificial Intelligence Center held the first ‘Technology Days at the Lipik Artificial Intelligence Center’ from May 2 to May 6, 2022. Over five days, participants were able to educate themselves about artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, the Microsoft Founders HUB, and Azure Cognitive Services, and during the hackathon, apply new knowledge using Azure tools to devise solutions for preserving the population of the world-renowned Lipizzaner horse breed. Everything concluded on Friday, May 6, with a central event where the best projects of the 2nd generation students of the AI center Lipik were presented, awards were given to the best hackathon teams, and a panel titled ‘The Future of Artificial Intelligence in Croatia’ was held. 

This hybrid event was held live in Lipik, as well as virtually via Microsoft’s Teams platform.  The first two days were dedicated to lectures and training conducted by Microsoft experts. Igor Pavleković, during his lecture, addressed the issue of protecting solutions based on artificial intelligence, as well as the data used in such solutions. He spoke about data security and cybersecurity issues through the lens of Microsoft Responsible AI guidelines. Tomislav Vračić discussed artificial intelligence in public administration projects and emphasized that artificial intelligence has become an integral part of life today. We use numerous services based on artificial intelligence, from digital assistants to shopping recommendations and driving instructions, and there are countless possibilities for artificial intelligence to enhance the provision of public services. He mentioned several interesting projects in which Microsoft is a partner to public administrations and touched upon the ethical use of artificial intelligence. Renata Šoić presented the Microsoft for Startups Founders HUB, which offers numerous free resources and support to startup founders during the development of their startups, and a workshop on Azure Cognitive Services was also held. Young AI programmers, in addition to acquiring new knowledge, had the opportunity to exchange experiences with Microsoft experts.

The last two days of the ‘Technology Days’ were reserved for the Hackathon, in which participants from training sessions and employees of Lipik startups took part. Five teams participated, and the AI Center programmers in Lipik tested and confirmed their newly acquired knowledge of working with tools provided by Azure. The winner of the first Lipik Hackathon was a team that included Ena Tutić, David Vorel, Darko Jurić, and Renato Jozinović. All competitors were also awarded vouchers for taking prestigious Microsoft Learn certifications.

– We thank Microsoft Croatia for their cooperation and support in developing our project at the Lipik Artificial Intelligence Center. The knowledge that our training participants and startup employees gained during the event ‘Technology Days at the Lipik Artificial Intelligence Center’ will surely open new horizons and provide new opportunities for the development of their careers and businesses – said Dejan Iličić, director of the Lipik Artificial Intelligence Center.

– We are pleased to support the first Croatian Artificial Intelligence Center by sharing the knowledge and experience of our experts. The Croatian AI scene is recording more and more successes, and we believe that Croatia is on the right path to position itself on the world map of AI solution providers, and Microsoft is here to support all efforts in that direction by sharing our expertise in this area – commented Tatjana Skoko, director of Microsoft Croatia.

As part of the award ceremony for the best teams at the hackathon, the best projects of the 2nd generation participants of the six-month training for developers for the application of artificial intelligence were also presented.

Thus, Darko Jurić and David Vorel presented the project of an Autonomous City and autonomous driving, and an extremely interesting project was also presented by Ivana Radošević and Tomislav Novosel, which is about a robotic arm controlled by artificial intelligence. Finally, Ivan Duspara presented a project explaining how to use artificial intelligence in rehabilitation.

In addition to lectures and the hackathon, participants could acquire new knowledge through a panel on artificial intelligence, specifically the future of artificial intelligence in Lipik and Croatia. The panelists were Tatjana Skoko, director of Microsoft Croatia, Ivan Šabić, assistant director of CARNET, Mario Čelan, founder of the gaming incubator PISMO Novska, Dejan Iličić, head of the Lipik Artificial Intelligence Center, and Martina Silov, project manager at CroAi – the Croatian Association for Artificial Intelligence, who also moderated this panel.

The event was attended by numerous esteemed guests, including Ferdinand Troha, deputy of the Požega-Slavonia County, Gordana Horvat, envoy of the mayor of the City of Lipik, and head of the Požega HZZ field office Jasminka Antunović.