University of Windsor's Dr. Robin Gras has helped launch a company that uses artificial intelligence to manage social media channels.University of Windsor's Dr. Robin Gras has helped launch a company that uses artificial intelligence to manage social media channels.

UWindsor prof launches AI-powered social media publishing platform

Struggling to keep up with all the Tweets, Posts and ‘Grams? A University of Windsor professor has helped launch a company that takes the stress out of social media.

Computer science professor Robin Gras said his San Francisco-based Movyl Technologies not only automates the functions of composing, curating, scheduling and publishing content across social platforms but engages with influencers and learns from these functions over time.

“Movyl Technologies came at the junction of two very important phenomena that are currently happening,” said Dr. Gras, Movyl’s chief science officer. “One is the very fast increase in social media usage every day and the other is the explosion in new machine learning techniques.”

An expert in artificial intelligence (AI) applications including deep learning, machine learning and neural networks, Gras worked closely with the team at Movyl to develop one of the first smart social media marketing platforms that uses AI to provide marketers with insights that broaden a brand’s reach and engagement while saving them money, time and reducing labor costs.

With social media expected to make up more than 70 per cent of marketing budgets by 2021, marketers at small to large companies alike are looking for solutions to keep up with the ever-increasing need to develop and publish content and analyze the vast amounts of data generated by that content.

Gras explained that Movyl uses AI to analyze data and generate sophisticated predictive models in order to deliver more effective future outcomes. He said the platform gives marketers the tools and insights they need to create comprehensive online campaigns and assess the effectiveness of those campaigns based on the text and content that their audience shares across 15 social media networks.

Movyl Technologies uses artificial intelligence to automate the functions of composing, curating, scheduling and publishing content across social platforms while engaging with influencers and learning from these functions over time.

Movyl Technologies uses artificial intelligence to automate the functions of composing, curating, scheduling and publishing content across social platforms while engaging with influencers and learning from these functions over time.

“Advanced machine learning techniques like deep learning, let our platform analyze and learn from very large amounts of data and use the information to make a future determination,” Gras said.

“With machine learning, marketers can now manage social campaigns in real time and have the AI adjust features dynamically as it learns the user’s preferences and the audience’s response. By entering a few keywords or basic information into the platform’s dashboard, the smart technology will scrape all the data on the Internet including social posts.”

Deep learning is a collection of algorithms that are capable of ingesting a lot more data than machine learning.

With AI collection and data analysis, Movyl lets marketers focus their team’s time on developing compelling storytelling. But Gras said he expects that is just the beginning.

“In the near future, I believe that the data collected through the AI will stretch beyond the social marketing departments to influence other business functions like product development or customer service,” he said.

Gras has been a professor at the University of Windsor since 2006 and is a former Canada Research Chair in Heuristics for Bioinformatics. Movyl Technologies launched its platform in May 2018. For more information about the company, visit its website at www.movyltech.net.


Dylan Kristy

mapOrganizers of a Welcome Week scavenger hunt are seeking partners to provide targets for participants.

Welcome Week organizers seeking partners for scavenger hunt and involvement fair

A scavenger hunt intended to familiarize new students with campus facilities needs partners to provide destinations for hunters. The event is set for Tuesday, September 4, as part of UWindsor Welcome Week orientation activities.

Organizer Amber Norman, student development specialist in the Student Success and Leadership Centre, says it’s a great opportunity for University offices and student organizations to raise their profiles.

“You’ll be able to get in on the ground floor with our new class of incoming students,” she says. “Let them know who you are, where you are, and what you do by hosting a stop on our scavenger hunt.”

Participants can even request a stop in their offices; find more information and a sign-up form online. To be considered for a stop, complete the form and submit by July 20.

Departments offering opportunities for students to get involved in campus life are better suited to the Involvement Fair, Norman says.

“We offer a multitude of ways for students to get engaged, and the Involvement Fair, held along Turtle Island Walk just before the scavenger hunt, is the perfect place to introduce them,” she says. “Of course, any organization wishing to partner in both are welcome!”

Sign up for an Involvement Fair display through the online form by July 20.

Also due by July 20 are the Program Orientation proposal forms for academic units planning sessions on Wednesday, September 5. Register an academic program orientation here.

The Welcome Week organizing committee will look after all orientation programming scheduled prior to the start of classes, and requires those planning a social event for after classes begin on September 6 to submit a proposal no later than Friday, June 29. Find the online proposal form here.

Meeting the proposal deadlines will enable the Student Success and Leadership Centre to properly allocate campus venues and promote events through materials that will be distributed to incoming students in August and September.

For further information, contact Norman at anorman@uwindsor.ca or 519-253-3000, ext. 3462.

Selina Gabriele and Jonathan BinderSelina Gabriele and Jonathan Binder are the founders of Articulus, developing an app to transcribe lectures.

Developers aiming for app to make education accessible

With the ubiquity of information today, education is evolving at an incredible pace, say two UWindsor computer science majors who are seeking innovations to make education accessible to everyone.

Selina Gabriele and Jonathan Binder are working with the RBC Summer Founders Program to develop Articulus, their education-centric application to distribute real-time lecture information.

The idea is to have professors wear mics that will provide registered students with live closed captioning of the lecture and store a transcript.

“Once we have the lecture in a text format, the possibilities are endless,” says Binder. “That text can be transformed into alternate languages or formats that optimize ease of consumption for a given individual.”

They hope that the founders program will give them access to networks to promote adoption of their platform.

“We are both well-versed in the tech world. Exploring libraries and evaluating this idea’s feasibility on a computer science level is where our strengths lie,” Gabriele says. “We are here in search of mentorship and guidance in the world of business.”

The two plan to focus first on students with disabilities, and hope to have a prototype ready for testing by the end of the summer.

This is the third in a series of articles introducing participants in the RBC Summer Founders Program, leading up to a showcase of their prototypes on August 1 at EPICentre. Learn more on the centre’s website.

The UWindsor research website has moved — make sure your hyperlinks to it still work.The UWindsor research website has moved — make sure your hyperlinks to it still work.

Update to research website means it’s time to check links

Campus departments should double-check any hyperlinks to University websites under the office of the vice-president, research and innovation, following an overhaul of its web presence at the start of this week, advises Rob Aitkens, web development team leader in the Office of Public Affairs and Communications.

The site has upgraded to Drupal version 7, with new pages for the vice-president’s office, the Office of Research and Innovation Services, the Research Ethics Board, the Research Safety Committee, and the Animal Care Committee.

“The new website is very well-organized and contains all the information clients need, but some of the URLs have changed,” Aitkens says. “Everyone should check their own websites to make sure their links are still working.”

The new site is accessible through www.uwindsor.ca/research.

“Gateway to Success"Titled “Gateway to Success,” the annual report of the World Health Innovation Network documents a year of growth and impact.

Report documents year of impact by World Health Innovation Network

The World Health Innovation Network (WIN) is a great source of pride for the Odette School of Business, says dean Mitch Fields, contributing to its ability to attract the best and brightest students, faculty, and partners.

“Through research, education and knowledge generation, WIN substantially accelerates the development and launch of technology and evidence-based tools to support supply chain transformation across global health systems,” Dr. Fields says in the network’s 2017-18 annual report, entitled Gateway to Success.

The report details what its chair, Anne Snowdon, calls an extraordinary year of growth and impact by the network.

“Through WIN, we are opening gateways to international collaboration, research, and capacity building that collectively strengthen countries’ economic and health frameworks to ensure the best value for citizens,” she says.

Read the full report on the WIN website.