The Seven Network disclosed the successful projects from the second series of its leading innovation scheme, Ignite. This initiative saw seven generative AI ideas derived from internal staff selected for prototype development. Ignite is an initiative that teams up engineers, data scientists, product managers, and staff from all over the business for a three-week period to generate pioneering ideas and enhance Seven's offerings and services.
With a record number of voluntary participants, nearly 60 ideas were proposed and subjected to a company-wide vote. The highest-ranked seven ideas were selected for development into prototypes, with the top project securing further development and integration into Seven's products and services. The latest series of Ignite focused primarily on generative artificial intelligence in sport throughout the 7plus platform, along with Amazon Web Services (AWS) suite of resources to improve user and client experiences.
Teams of varying skills and backgrounds worked together to develop their proposals under tight deadlines. Following the developmental stage of the prototypes, they received specialised training from AWS architects. The panel tasked with judging included Nina Walsh, Head of Media amp; Entertainment Business Development, Asia Pacific, Japan & Americas, AWS; Lucinda Gemmell, Chief People and Culture Officer at Seven; 7SPORT Digital Executive Producer Tara Carlon; and Rachel Page, Seven's Network Digital Sales Director.
The winning concept, Preview Town, is a revolutionary project that provides short preview trailers when a user selects a piece of content. Liz De Nobrega led the victorious team. It featured Luke Jensen, Andrew Green, David Van Oosterom, Rakib Dewan, Aaron Bush, Stefan Creovina, Zinnia Wang, Safeera Kuttiyoth and Marcus Torre.
Will Everitt, Seven's Director of Product Solutions, commented, "Seven is renowned for its top-flight team of engineers, and Ignite is proof of our dedication to developing our technology talent. Ignite fosters collaboration across typically standalone parts of the business, allowing engineers to work directly with sports journalists, commercial teams and other departments, gaining insight into their unique challenges."
The Ignite program emphasises Seven's commitment to nurturing innovation within. At the end of each Ignite event, there is an enhancement in understanding of the capabilities and limitations of emergent tech amongst all participants. They learn vital project-scoping skills grounded by the availability of resources and time. This augments the technological literacy of non-engineers, promoting improved working relationships across Seven.
Nina Walsh, AWS, stated, "The Six West Media leadership team deserve recognition for their consistent investment in expanding the cloud skills across their teams. By pairing the talent development with an innovative and collaborative culture, they achieved exceptional outcomes."
"Creativity came boiling to the surface as the teams utilised AWS services to bring their ideas to life using our most recent AI tech. The high standard of concepts put forward for judgement truly raised the bar."
"I am thrilled to observe the next series of prototypes as we continue our partnership with the talented team at Seven West Media," said Walsh.