Conversational AI

Amazon panel discusses Alexa Prize and other applied science initiatives at WSDM 2021

Watch a recording of the presentation and Q&A roundtable featuring Amazon scientists and scholars.

By Staff writer

March 11, 2021

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Amazon was a Platinum sponsor of WSDM 2021, a conference promoting best practices and advances in operations research, management science, and analytics to improve operational processes, decision-making, and outcomes. A number of Amazon scientists and scholars participated in the event as members of the organizing committee, and by leading tutorials and workshops at the virtual conference.

During the web search-focused conference, seven Amazon scientists gathered for a roundtable event where Amazon Scholar Eugene Agichtein talked about the Alexa Prize Socialbot Grand Challenge from his perspective as a faculty advisor to the Emory University team in the first two years of the competition. He also introduced the newly announced Alexa Prize TaskBot Challenge, in which university teams will compete to develop agents that assist customers in completing tasks requiring multiple steps and decisions.

Following Agichtein's presentation, the panelists participated in a Q&A panel discussion on Amazon's collaborations with academia, their careers and scientific focus areas, and more. If you missed the event, or were unable to watch the live session, you can watch the recording above, which features:

Yoelle Maarek, vice president of research and science, Alexa Shopping
Eugene Agichtein, Amazon Scholar, Alexa Shopping
Liane Lewin-Eytan, senior manager, applied science, Alexa Shopping
Andrew Borthwick, principal applied scientist, Amazon Selection and Catalog Systems
Karthik Subbian, principal applied scientist, Search Science and Artificial Intelligence
Hugo Zaragoza, senior manager, applied science, Amazon Books
Nikhita Vedula, applied scientist, Alexa Shopping

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