What is the UKTIN R&D Discovery Toolkit and why do we need it?

By Guy Matthews 30 Oct 24 Reading time: 4 mins

The UK’s complex and fragmented telecoms sector can be a navigational nightmare for those seeking to extract actionable information from it. These might be people in search of investment opportunities, or after data on market trends. Or perhaps academics who need reliable facts for their research. The market’s storied and uneven evolution over many decades means that potentially useful data is dispersed across a patchwork of unconnected sources. What has been missing to date is a means of making this fragmented mess of information available through a cohesive, user-friendly platform, open to all who need it.

Well, now we have such a means. The UK Telecoms Innovation Network (UKTIN) has debuted its AI-powered R&D Discovery Toolkit as part of a mission to democratise the telecoms ecosystem by making it easier to navigate. UKTIN’s underlying objective is to commercialise university research and forge partnerships between academia and entrepreneurial interests. Its new toolkit is an effective front door into UK telecoms, allowing a variety of stakeholders to understand and engage with the various technical competencies to be found across the country.

The tool, created with help from partners such as Digital Catapult and Cambridge Wireless, is at the disposal of companies, investors, and other organisations so that they can discover and connect with people who are active in particular R&D areas. The idea is to drive better and more efficient collaborations, as well as provide a platform to share research, resources, and facilities.

It works by using AI-driven semantic search techniques combined with large language models (LLMs) to enhance data discoverability, allowing users to easily define their interests and access the latest and most relevant information. Its interactive data interpretation feature enables users to ‘chat’ with the data and transform raw information into actionable insights. The power of AI allows vast amounts of data to be summarised, perhaps concerning potential companies in which to invest, or university research groups working in a specific area. As well as harnessing the power of LLMs, the toolkit leverages Google’s Gemini models.

AI-enabled access

Heading the development of the toolkit has been the University of Bristol’s Professor Dimitra Simeonidou. She is also leader of UKTIN’s UK Research Capability, co-director of the Bristol Digital Futures Institute, and director of Bristol’s Smart Internet Lab where much of the development work on the toolkit was done.

Speaking at the toolkit’s launch at the Smart Internet Lab facility in the heart of Bristol, Simeonidou outlined its gestation: “Our gameplan was to invest in AI and LLMs to create a search tool to give us a range of benefits,” she explained. “It’s fair to say that we were met initially with some scepticism. Where we are now is the result of all the work of a small but very determined team of people.”

She defined progress to date as AI-enabled democratic access to an ecosystem of assets: “We have more to achieve, but what we have done so far is a big tick. It will already allow users to spend their time actually analysing, rather than wasting it on searching for the data they want.”

Simeonidou is already looking ahead to a second phase: “I want to start working more with the innovation sector to see how this kind of information could be used to support new ideas. I would like to make it work for businesses at the cutting edge looking for partners and collaborators, making databases available that have value in a commercial context so people can get insights from that.”

Opening up information for all

The tool distinguishes itself with its ability to save valuable time, added Ian Smith, head of UKTIN: “Looking at university websites can be difficult,” he claimed, speaking at the launch. “The information is out there, but a lot of it is bound up in individual siloes associated with one or other institution. To get a proper overview you have to trawl through an awful lot of different places. One institution might have a deep relationship with one or perhaps two other institutions, but that doesn’t scale at all. This tool will spark a conversation with another body that you’d never have thought of.”

Looking ahead to future applications of the toolkit, Smith hoped it could lead to new and patentable ideas: “I expect investors and venture capitalists to use it to put money into defensible assets,” he said. “Companies can find value in the research enabled by this tool before patents are created. It’s time to open up the huge investment the UK makes in R&D to investors. That’s where I think this tool is taking us.”

UKTIN may have set the pace, but Smith doesn’t doubt that rival tools will emerge in Europe and beyond: “But the speed and functionality of this tool, especially when considering the small size of the team that created it, is exceptional,” he enthused. “We’re launching it for the benefit of telecoms, but you can easily see how it could be used by other industries. Perhaps the quantum sector or medical and biomedical.”

Guy Matthews / Writer

Guy has been a technology journalist for over 35 years during which time he has edited and written for numerous newspapers and magazines. A particular specialism for the past 20 years has been the market for wholesale telecoms services. As one of the main freelance writers for Capacity magazine, Guy has written in depth on topics ranging from developments in subsea cabling and the evolution of the Internet of Things to Carrier Ethernet standards and the challenges of network security. He has also contributed to European Communications, Mobile Europe, Vanilla Plus, IoT Now and The Register.