Leading UK photonics company licenses PhD student’s deep learning technology

EEE’s Optical Networks Group (ONG) student, Zacharaya Shabka, has developed a deep reinforcement learning (DRL) for fast and effective control parameter optimisation under the supervision of Professor Georgios Zervas.

UCL Business (UCLB), the commercialisation company for UCL (University College London), has entered into a commercial licensing agreement with Polatis for the use of the DRL technology, developed directly as a result of Zacharaya’s PhD project. 

UCLB has also filed a patent application for the method developed by Zacharaya to generate optimised control parameters in a production scalable manner.

Apoorva Srikkanth, Business Manager at UCLB states:

Zacharaya’s work with Polatis and the subsequent licensing outcome is an excellent example of how early engagement with industry partners allows for real-world impact of academic research. The academic team involved UCLB as soon as they saw a commercial potential in the project which helped us have early discussions with Polatis to develop a feasible technology transfer plan.

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