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Create IT opens Research and Development Center this month in Évora

January 8, 2019
Évora's new R&D Center focuses on ML, Gamification, Analytics for cloud solutions, aiming to establish Portugal as a global leader in these fields.

Create IT, a Portuguese company focused on the development of business-critical cross-platform systems, will open this month a Research and Development Center (R&D) in Évora focused on Machine Learning, Gamification and Analytics for application in cloud solutions.

The new solutions to be developed at the Center will be targeted to cloud distributors and resellers, namely:

  • Resellers starting the reselling business of Cloud Providers services (such as Microsoft and Symantec);
  • Resellers that have already started activity and want to automate the operations management, better understand the clients' portfolio and give them greater value;
  • Resellers with a high level of customization of their systems and customized integration needs.

Currently, for this market, there are only general players with transversal offers, not solutions with assessment and prediction capabilities. This is a competitive advantage and a great bet of the new Create IT R&D Center. Among the innovations to be developed are:

  • Mechanisms that support high loads and scalability, allowing to drastically reduce the provisioning and extraction times and data analysis;
  • Intelligent recommendation and simulation mechanisms based on Business Analytics, Machine Learning, and Big Data, enabling Cloud Providers to better understand customers, react in advance, and help them choose the right services for their scenario (identify Churn and UpSell opportunities with high confidence levels);
  • Incentive mechanisms for the adoption of Gamification-based services, enabling Cloud Providers to assist their customers in making full use of contracted services (to quickly measure the level of service use, and to encourage users to improve their level of adoption).

Regarding the target geographies of the new solutions, in the SaaS model the scope will be global, that is, it is aimed at companies with operations in the 5 continents. In the Services model, which typically implies a greater level of proximity, the bet will be in Western Europe, namely Northern Europe - Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland, and Ireland.

According to Nuno Guerra, CEO of Create IT, "It is with great satisfaction that we take this important step in the history of Create IT. Over time, it has always been our intention to follow the dynamics and evolution of both the market in general and the challenges of our customers in particular. The areas of Machine Learning, Gamification and Analytics are critical today for those who want to be competitive, and are the focus of our new R&D center: to take advantage of the enormous potential of human capital in our country to create innovative products that allow the democratization of access to state-of-the-art technologies, focused on giving the 'extra mile' that businesses need to be more efficient and make better decisions. "

The skills and solutions envisaged for the R&D Center will be carried out in partnership with the University of Évora and the headquarters will be located in the facilities of EvoraTech. On the basis of this choice are factors such as:

  • The possibility of performing internships and end-of-course projects with students from the University of Évora;
  • Guarantee of total immersion of the R&D team in the projects, with a greater focus and specialization of the team;
  • The possibility of developing nearshore centers in Évora for international clients, for whom the University of Évora can provide training and a base for the recruitment of qualified workforce.

José Calixto, Chairman of the Board of Directors of ADRAL (Alentejo Regional Development Agency), points out that "The technology-based entrepreneurship ecosystem has seen a growing dynamic in Alentejo. In Évora we are hosting initiatives that are increasingly innovative and global, such as the new Create IT R&D Center at international level, to which many others will follow. It is our firm commitment to continue investing in strengthening the network of local-based strategic partnerships and to design new acceleration initiatives in the territory, complementing existing ones and contributing to the setting of new R&D initiatives, greater resilience and commercial recognition of the companies that leverage them in digital transformation."

This whole process started in October 2018 based on a Research & Development project.