̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge - Andy Hopper

Cambridge alumni's tech firm startup Improbable raises $500m

ts657 — Sat, 13 May 2017 12:10:48 +0000

̽��ֱ��company, which helps companies build complex simulations and virtual worlds, has been valued at more than $1bn after raising $502m (£390m) from Japan’s SoftBank.

̽��ֱ��investment in the London-based firm is thought to be the largest made in a fledgling European tech firm.

Founders Narula, 29, and Whitehead, 26, who both studied computer science at the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge, launched Improbable in 2012 with Peter Lipka, 28, an Imperial College alumnus.

̽��ֱ��Cambridge alumni met at a dissertation review at Cambridge’s Computer Laboratory, sharing a mutual interest in multiplayer games and virtual worlds that put them on the path to creating the software that underpins Improbable.

Improbable creates the software to build hugely complex and interactive virtual worlds as well as complex simulations useful to industry and government. It could, for example, give researchers the ability to create simulated cities to model the behaviour of millions of people.

Narula has been credited with saying his vision of Improbable’s ultimate goal is to create totally immersive, persistent virtual worlds, and in doing so, change how we make decisions - “Basically, we want to build the Matrix,” he once joked.

Improbable’s clients have included tech giants, video game makers and universities.

Narula and Whitehead are the latest in a string of commercialisation success stories from the Computer Laboratory, including Deepmind and ‘next word prediction’ app Swiftkey. ̽��ֱ��Computer Lab Ring had named Improbable its Company of the Year 2017 only last month.

Head of the Computer Laboratory, Professor Andy Hopper, said: “This is a fantastic achievement, and a testament to Cambridge’s role as an innovation hub. While most people see innovation when fast growing firms hit the headlines, here at Cambridge we are dedicated to providing the time, space and resources to ensuring knowledge can develop incrementally and build impact cumulatively.”

Pro-Vice-Chancellor Enterprise and Business Relations Andy Neely said: “This is another great example of how our alumni – and the startups and spin-outs that come out of Cambridge – are supporting the UK in commercialising our world leading science base to drive growth across the country.”

̽��ֱ��Collegiate ̽��ֱ�� has been instrumental in founding and developing infrastructure to facilitate the ‘Cambridge Tech Cluster’. It has enabled innovation and commercialisation with incubator spaces and science parks, education programmes such as Accelerate Cambridge, Ignite and the Impulse Programme, and the provision of seed funds and patient capital.

̽��ֱ��results speak for themselves ‐ more than 300 high‐tech ventures involving ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge people and technology have been created in the last 20 years; over 240 firms have been founded by alumni of the Cambridge ̽��ֱ�� Computer Lab; while spin‐outs from the Cambridge Enterprise portfolio have raised in excess of £1.4 billion follow‐on funding.

Cambridge Enterprise administers one of the most successful (and patient) seed funds in the country. Over 64% of Cambridge Enterprise supported firms have a five‐year survival rate (compared with 42% nationally).

Improbable, founded by Cambridge alumni Herman Narula (Girton 2007) and Rob Whitehead (Robinson 2009), became the UK's latest $1billion tech startup this week.

This is another great example of how our alumni – and the startups and spin-outs that come out of Cambridge – are supporting the UK in commercialising our world leading science base to drive growth across the country

Pro-Vice-Chancellor Enterprise and Business Relations Andy Neely

NINPO/Improbable

Screenshot from Vanishing Stars, a game developed using the SpatialOS operating system built by Improbable.

̽��ֱ��text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. For image use please see separate credits above.

Yes

Making operating systems safer and faster with ‘unikernels’

sc604 — Thu, 28 Jan 2016 08:00:00 +0000

Specialised computer software components to improve the security, speed and scale of data processing in cloud computing are being developed by a ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge spin-out company. ̽��ֱ��company, Unikernel Systems, which was formed by staff and postdoctoral researchers at the ̽��ֱ�� Computer Laboratory, has recently been acquired by San-Francisco based software company Docker Inc.

Unikernels are small, potentially transient computer modules specialised to undertake a single task at the point in time when it is needed. Because of their reduced size, they are far more secure than traditional operating systems, and can be started up and shut down quickly and cheaply, providing flexibility and further security.

They are likely to become increasingly used in applications where security and efficiency are vital, such as systems storing personal data and applications for the so-called Internet of Things (IoT) – internet-connected appliances and consumer products.

“Unikernels provide the means to run the same application code on radically different environments from the public cloud to IoT devices,” said Dr Richard Mortier of the Computer Laboratory, one of the company’s advisors. “This allows decisions about where to run things to be revisited in the light of experience - providing greater flexibility and resilience. It also means software on those IoT devices is going to be a lot more reliable."

Recent years have seen a huge increase in the amount of data that is collected, stored and processed, a trend that will only continue as increasing numbers of devices are connected to the internet. Most commercial data storage and processing now takes place within huge datacentres run by specialist providers, rather than on individual machines and company servers; the individual elements of this system are obscured to end users within the ‘cloud’. One of the technologies that has been instrumental in making this happen is virtual machines.

Normally, a virtual machine (VM) runs just like a real computer, with its own virtual operating system – just as your desktop computer might run Windows. However, a single real machine can run many VMs concurrently. VMs are general purpose, able to handle a wide range of jobs from different types of user, and capable of being moved across real machines within datacentres in response to overall user demand. ̽��ֱ�� ̽��ֱ��’s Computer Laboratory started research on virtualisation in 1999, and the Xen virtual machine monitor that resulted now provides the basis for much of the present-day cloud.

Although VMs have driven the development of the cloud (and greatly reduced energy consumption), their inherent flexibility can come at a cost if their virtual operating systems are the generic Linux or Windows systems. These operating systems are large and complex, they have significant memory footprints, and they take time to start up each time they are required. Security is also an issue, because of their relatively large ‘attack surface’.

Given that many VMs are actually used to undertake a single function, (e.g. acting as a company database), recent research has shifted to minimising complexity and improving security by taking advantage of the narrow functionality. And this is where unikernels come in.

Researchers at the Computer Laboratory started restructuring VMs into flexible modular components in 2009, as part of the RCUK-funded MirageOS project. These specialised modules – or unikernels - are in effect the opposite of generic VMs. Each one is designed to undertake a single task; they are small, simple and quick, using just enough code to enable the relevant application or process to run (about 4% of a traditional operating system according to one estimate).

̽��ֱ��small size of unikernels also lends considerable security advantages, as they present a much smaller ‘surface’ to malicious attack, and also enable companies to separate out different data processing tasks in order to limit the effects of any security breach that does occur. Given that resource use within the cloud is metered and charged, they also provide considerable cost savings to end users.

By the end of last year, the unikernel technology arising from MirageOS was sufficiently advanced that the team, led by Dr. Anil Madhavapeddy, decided to found a start-up company. ̽��ֱ��company, Unikernel Systems, was recently acquired by San Francisco-based Docker Inc. to accelerate the development and broad adoption of the technology, now envisaged as a critical element in the future of the Internet of Things.

“This brings together one of the most significant developments in operating systems technology of recent years, with one of the most dynamic startups that has already revolutionised the way we use cloud computing. This link-up will truly allow us all to “rethink cloud infrastructure”, said Balraj Singh, co-founder and CEO of Unikernel Systems.

“This acquisition shows that the Computer Laboratory continues to produce innovations that find their way into mainstream developments. It also shows the power of open source development to have impact and to be commercially successful”, said Professor Andy Hopper, Head of the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge Computer Laboratory.

Technology to improve the security, speed and scale of data processing in age of the Internet of Things is being developed by a Cambridge spin-out company.

This acquisition shows the power of open source development to have impact and to be commercially successful.

Andy Hopper

̽��ֱ��text in this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. For image use please see separate credits above.

Yes

Computing for the Future of the Planet wins Google funding

lw355 — Sat, 01 May 2010 09:13:48 +0000

In the first-ever round of Google Focused Research Awards, Professor Andy Hopper, Head of the Computer Laboratory, has been awarded funding towards Computing for the Future of the Planet, a research programme that has set its sights on what computing can do for the environment.

Explaining the ethos behind the research he leads, Professor Hopper said: ‘Computing has had an enormous impact on the way we live and work, and a natural extension is to harness its power to solve problems facing the planet, whether it’s energy consumption, pollution, congestion or sustainable living. Over the past five years, we have developed a strong interdisciplinary vision of a computer-based framework that will improve the way we live, and have been building and testing the deep-engineering technology needed to achieve it.’

Computing for the Future of the Planet has several goals: an optimal digital infrastructure, sensing and optimising with a global world model, reliably predicting and reacting to our environment, and digital alternatives to physical activities.

One research area under investigation is a personal energy meter that would enable individuals to calculate their energy use in real-time. Pulling information together from a variety of sources, the meter would calculate not only the energy being used directly by the user but also the shared energy use of, for example, the buildings they work in, public transport and even national overheads like healthcare.

Google has awarded a total of $5.7 million to 13 projects through their recent Research Awards scheme, with Cambridge being the only institution outside the USA to win funding. ‘Refreshingly, the gift from Google places no restrictions on the funded research,’ said Professor Hopper. ‘ ̽��ֱ��nature of the award is simply to stimulate and accelerate the development of new ideas and practical solutions in these innovative areas.’

For more information, please contact Professor Andy Hopper (ah12@cam.ac.uk).

A gift from Google will help Computing for the Future of the Planet.

Computing has had an enormous impact on the way we live and work, and a natural extension is to harness its power to solve problems facing the planet, whether it’s energy consumption, pollution, congestion or sustainable living.

Professor Andy Hopper

Computing for the Future of the Planet

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Yes