Wildfire spread prediction
WWF (World Wide Fund for Nature)
Problem
- Wildfires can pose threats to ecosystems throughout the world, but in South America, the effects of deforestation can be particularly severe.
organizations like WWF Bolivia and FAN constantly seek to improve their threat-modelling capabilities.
Solution
- Unit8 joined forces with WWF and Bolivian FAN NGO to leverage technology to help predict the spread of wildfires
Our key objective was to identify and implement technological solutions that could supplement the existing work of WWF and FAN in the detection, modeling, and elimination of wildfire threats.
Impact
- The goal of the collaboration is to obtain faster reaction times to help authorities decide which zones and communities should be evacuated, and when.
Causal Inference Library
Multinational Consumer Electronics Company
Developing internal causal inference library consisting of 10+ algorithms and applied library to 2 use cases
Challenge
- Build causal inference library to be used by other data scientists in the future for various projects
- Enable activities such as churn analysis and A/B testing to be conducted
Solution
- Developed library in collaboration with internal stakeholders, did unite testing/documentation/user guide
- Worked on two related use cases needed for the analysis
- Unit8 implemented 60% of the algorithms for the project
Business impact
- Library enables data scientists to easily use multiple algorithms for causal inference through a unified API design
- 10+ algorithms implemented
Due Diligence Tool
US Law Firm
Building an application to streamline the due diligence process through a combination of automated web searches and web scraping
Challenge
- Client offers due diligence as a service
- Due diligence process is multi-tenant; users from multiple separate parties work together
- Process slowed down by back-and-forth communication and repetitive tasks
- Goal was to automate due diligence process
Solution
- Built a multi-tenant application to streamline the due diligence process end-to-end
- Implemented automated web search, website scraping and screening of entities linked to the target company
Business impact
- Project still in deployment, no impact available at this time
Digital Twin & Production Line Simulation
Glass Bottle Manufacturer
Developing tools on Foundry and applying causal models to identify optimal steps in glass bottle production process to increase yield of production line
Challenge
- Want to improve yield on production line form 86% to 90%
- Already identified step in process where gain could be realised
- But no way to automatically prioritise sensor data which should be further analysed
- Goal is to apply ML models to identify most promising captors to improve yield
Solution
- Initially built E2E model of yield on production line, but hit data quality roadblock
- Shifted towards:
- developing tool on Foundry to surface “golden production parameters” when production quality was high
- using causal models to understand optimal actions to stabilise first step of production process
Business impact
- Highlighted data quality issues and suggested next best steps for improvements
- Demonstrate Foundry’s ability to replace existing system
- Trained key internal stakeholders on Foundry platform
- Due to lack of high quality sensor data → no direct impact on yield realised during the PoC
Supply Chain Demand Forecasting
Medical Equipment Manufacturer
Building a forecasting model for a medical equipment manufacturer resulting in significant forecasting accuracy improvements allowing better procurement planning and contract management
Challenge
- Forecasting challenges when it comes to their supply chain
- Demand Planners working very manually with back and forth between planners, sales, and manufacturing
- Goal is to improve this with a more intelligent tool
Solution
- Built forecasting model with features included in Darts in combination with hierarchical reconciliation
- Solution would stream data directly from SAP
Impact
- Forecasting improvements of 10-60% compared with historical forecasting methods, depending on the time outlook in the model
- Helps procurement negotiate better contracts with suppliers and plan manufacturing accordingly
Data Management, Forecast, and Visualization on Foundry
Swiss Raw Material Vendor
Demonstrated how a cloud platform can ingest different data sources and made dashboards and applications that could drive strategic decision-making
Challenge
- Client wanted to have a view of the current raw material inventory in the warehouse
- Need to forecast the inventory on customer side in order to optimize production and logistic cost and to increase customer satisfaction
Solution
- Data ingestion from different data sources including SAP, MeteoSwiss, and IoT devices
- Using Supply Chain offerings to define ontology
- Clean data
- Apply forecasting models through our Darts library
Business impact
- Showcase different forecasting models alternatives
- Optimized warehouse logistics
- Reduced excess inventory stock
Forest Wildfire Spread Prediction
World Wildlife Fund (WWF)
Developed a wildfire prediction system in collaboration with WWF to anticipate wildfire in Bolivian forests through a new fuel model based on geo data
Challenge
- Bolivian forests are at a high risk of wildfire
- Wildfire prediction system needed to anticipate how a fire might start and where it will spread
Solution
- Used publicly available data such as weather, climate, past fires, and geo data to model the wildfire spread starting at a certain point in time
- Created a new fuel model for Bolivia by transferring knowledge from available US data
Business impact
- A complete fuel model for the Bolivian territory is now available
- Applications created enable visualisation of past fires
- Discovered main pain points of ML with geo data and established a clear plan on how to tackle them and speed up future use cases
Data enrichment with external assets
International institution
Problem
- Enrichment of the internal data with the publicly available external data
- Automation of the process and integration in the internal workflows
Solution
- Cloud web scraping – Automated mechanism to collect/integrate and use the external data
Impact
- Automated, best-in-industry data assets (internal and external) that maximize the quality of its data analysis and AI model