Grant: Applied Research and Development Grants - Level 2

The objective of this proposal is to develop an Artificial Intelligence (AI) Platform (development and run-time environments) for ING Robotic (ING Robotic Avionics Inc.) drones in order to make them as autonomous as possible in the execution of their mission. This platform will enable local intelligence embedded inside the drone to make local real-time decisions without having to communicate with the Ground Control Station. ING Robotic drones, current and future, have a range of 10 to 100 km, and may operate beyond the range of telemetry, without mobile internet, or even GPS; therefore, the ability to execute their mission autonomously is critical. With the AI Platform, we also plan to deliver one set of Applications for the autonomous visual inspection of power lines, pipelines, rail tracks, roads and bridges. Our approach to applied research is to combine Agile software development with the Design Science Research in Information Systems methodology, where the research outcome is an artifact (the Drone AI Platform and the Applications). This applied research will be undertaken jointly by the Center of Expertise in Smart Prototyping (CEPI) of Collège La Cité and ING Robotic. The benefits for ING Robotic would be an increased productivity for their application developers, a shorter time-to-market for their products, and a lower dependency on Artificial Intelligence skills which are notoriously difficult to acquire on the market. Another longer-term benefit is an increased differentiation of their products against any competition. The benefits for the Collège are a focused training of our students in an area most relevant to industry needs, and a higher hiring rate of these students. The main benefits to the applied research discipline are an increase in the discipline knowledge base with the addition of real-time embedded AI knowledge, know-how, and software technology which are deeply relevant to the industry needs.