TeraLab: data expertise at the service of businesses

What is the role of the TeraLab platform?

Anne-Sophie Taillandier: We offer companies access to researchers, students and innovative companies, to help them overcome the technological obstacles to using their own data. We provide technical resources, infrastructures, tools and support skills in a sovereign, secure and neutral environment. This enables companies to prototype products or services as close as possible to real-life situations, for the fastest possible technology transfer.

How do you work with companies?

AST: First of all, we help to formalize the use case. Companies often come to us with a vague idea of the use case they need to address. So we help them, bringing in experts if necessary. This is a crucial stage, because our aim is also to enable companies to assess the return on investment at the end of their research or innovation work. This enables them to study the investment required to put the product into production. Then we help them understand what they can do with the data. Here again, we can call in legal experts if necessary. And finally, we help them specify the technical architecture.

How do you differentiate yourself from other Big Data and artificial intelligence service platforms?

AST: First and foremost, through the ecosystem we benefit from. TeraLab is attached to the ITM, so we benefit from a large number of researchers who are experts on these subjects, and students who we can mobilize to meet the technological challenges posed by companies. Secondly, TeraLab is a pre-competitive platform. We are also able to define a framework that combines legal and technical aspects to provide a customized response to a company's needs. We can strike a fine balance between security and flexibility to reassure the organizations that call on us, and at the same time give researchers enough leeway to find solutions to the problems posed.

What level of technical security can you provide?

AST: Technically, we can go as far as a hyper-secure level where the user of the data provided - the researcher, for example - can see the data but never extract it. Generally speaking, to get data out of the workspace, you have to go through a validation process involving the data provider and the TeraLab team. So it's a mix of technical and legal aspects that ensures data security during the project. What's more, we are a neutral and sovereign space, which also ensures a form of independence that reassures companies.

What does neutrality mean to you?

AST: We offer open-source technical components. We have nothing against licensed products, but if a company wants to use such a tool, it has to provide the license itself. Our technical team has a very good knowledge of the various libraries and APIs, and of the components needed to set up a workspace. They adapt the tools to the company's needs. At the end of an experiment, we don't intend to host the service beyond that point. We enter a second phase of technology transfer, so that services or products can be integrated at the customer's premises. So we have nothing to "sell" other than our expertise. That's what also ensures our neutrality.

What use cases are you working on?

AST: Since the start of TeraLab, over 60 projects have run on the platform, and we currently have 20 in parallel. They can range from 3 months to 3 years. We've had projects in logistics, insurance, utilities, energy, mobility, agriculture... Right now, we're focusing on three sectors. The first is cybersecurity: we're interested in finding out what are the barriers to accessing data, how to bring an environment into compliance, and how to ensure respect for personal information. We also work a lot on healthcare and industry. In terms of geography, we are increasingly working at European level as part of H2020 projects. What's more, the platform is enjoying growing recognition from European institutions, notably with the "Silver i-space" label awarded by the BDVA.

What does TeraLab look like in physical terms?

AST: TeraLab has machines in Douai, a technical team in Rennes, and a business team in Paris. The platform can be accessed remotely, so there's no need to be physically close to the platform, which sets us apart from other service platforms. More recently, we've been able to secure machines directly on the customer's premises, if the customer has particular constraints regarding the movement of data.