87 Interviews

AggregateDBSponsor: Conflict and Stabilization Operations (CSO)Point of Contact: Santiago Stocker

Original Challenge:CSO needs to acquire more information about informal leaders.

Final Problem Solved:American Diplomats have this information, but it is unstructured, inefficient and difficult to access.

MS Computer Science

Software Engineer, Machine Learning

NLP & Data Mining

Meet Our Team

Shutong Zhang

BS Computer Science

Front-End, UI/UX

Software EngineerChristian Valadez

BA History

Minor Arabic

Regional ExpertNathan Hausman

Start from a real story...

A Case Study : Crisis in Algeria

21 Days until shutdown....

Helicopter Company

A Case Study : Crisis in Algeria

Embassy in Algeria

18 Days until shutdown....

Helicopter Company

A Case Study : Crisis in Algeria

Embassy in Algeria

16 Days until shutdown....

Diplomat: “Who Do I Talk To?”

Helicopter Company

A Case Study : Crisis in Algeria

Embassy in Algeria

0 Days until shutdown....

Diplomat: “Who Do I Talk To?”

Helicopter Compayny

Policy Maker: Informed Diplomat

A Case Study : Crisis in Algeria

Embassy in Algeria

0 Days until shutdown....

Diplomat: “Who Do I Talk To?”

Helicopter Company

Policy Maker: Informed Diplomat

“Real people and real companies suffer when diplomats can’t find the

right people at the right time.”

Our Journey

Understand the Real Problem

Proposed an Embassy

Portal

MVP #1

MVP 1: Connecting CSO to Embassy

MVP 1: Connecting CSO to Embassy● Reviewed With 2 policy makers, 8 diplomats

Uniform feedback from Diplomats in Africa:

“I do not have time to reupload this

information.” x10 “Just make the policy makers read my

cables.”

Our Journey

Understand the Real Problem

Proposed an Embassy

Portal

Cable Scraping

MVP #1

MVP 2: Summarizing Classified Cables

Use Natural Language Processing to “scrape” key - Names- Locations- Dates

MVP 2: Summarizing Classified Cables● Reviewed with 10 diplomats, 5 desk officers and 2

technologists

Diplomat: “Foggy Bottom is a cable monster.” x10

Desk Officer : “Cables are classified, unaggregated and unstructured.” Policy Maker: “Cables don’t show

relationships I need to know.”

MVP 2: Summarizing Classified Cables

2018

Cable Monster

Technologists Diplomats

Customer PivotFrom Policy Makers to Diplomats

Our Journey

Understand the Real Problem

Proposed an Embassy

Portal

Cable Scraping

Contact Network

Map

MVP #1 Pivot #1

MVP 3: Contact Network Map

MVP 3: Contact Network Map● Reviewed With 8 diplomats

Diplomats (Political/Economic):

“I really only need this to map my 10 closest contacts.”

“Finally, a product that addresses the needs of diplomats on the ground!

Contact Management &

Suggestion

Diplomat (Public Affairs):“Hey wait, can this

thing suggest people to invite to diplomatic functions?”

Contact Management &

Suggestion

Diplomat (Public Affairs):“Hey wait, can this

thing suggest people to invite to diplomatic functions?”

Beneficiaries

Mission AchievementMission Budget/Costs

Buy-In/Support

Deployment

Value PropositionKey Activities

Key Resources

Key Partners

CSO: Santiago - Writing report about Boko HaramTyler - Analyzing relationship between known members of BH and unclassified actorsWill Meeker - Travels to Nigeria for 2 years to generate contacts for CSO, get Santiago data

Embassy Staff:LES: Locally engaged staff Caroline: Economic/ Political Officer at small Embassy in stable countryJames/Steve: Economic/ Political Officer at large Embassy in an unstable country Nick: Public Diplomacy Officer at busy Embassy

S/ES& Special ProjectsKapil Gupta: Commitment to show off our demonstrate prototype John Janek:Will send our prototype to Mauritania Embassy friends w/DCM

Foreign Nationals:(OMS): Office Management Specialists and LES To implement and upkeep program at each embassy with updated information about contacts from events/meetings

Individual FSO buy-in

DCM to okay program at 1 embassy as test case and delegate time for FSO’s and LES to test/use

Kapil Gupta: Commitment to show off our demonstrate prototype

CSO Sponsor: Santiago Stocker

IDEO team leader for QDDR

A Dev Garden Consulting: TAP, SBIR, Accelerator/Combinator and Angel Funding consulting, connections, proposal writing

Beta starts in Nigeria Embassy, with Vanguard newspaper(English) and twitter hexagon of Abuja

Target 8 Countries in MENA- Saudi, Israel, Qatar... when NLP+AI perfected, final contract from DOS when product 3.0 ready for world-wide deployment

Need CSO to continue connecting us upstream w/ former clients and downstream with data sources in field

DCM initial support, for 1 or more POL/ECON sections FSO to implement first 10 names that come to mind, LES long term key holders

Source Aggregation: Gives organizations the ability to identify most important actors in rapidly evolving situations using data mined from a breadth of sources.

Hierarchy visualization: ensure people from all backgrounds can analyze and filter relevant data depending on their needs.

Extraction/Suggestion: Perform natural language processing on news articles, twitter and etc to extract categories and information for informal leaders. Suggest novel contacts for each FSO based on known network.

Improve CSO’s ability to write relevant reports by giving them tools for passive “granular” data collection w/o Embassy involvementProvide long-term contact management, node mapping software, hierarchical ranking software, news feed of recent activity of known contacts new contacts discoveryContact suggestion that cuts reliable informant acquisition time in half

Current contact management and information collection

New contact discovery and understanding

Previously published unclassified reports commissioned by DOS

Nigerian news papersgurdian, sahara Times, Punch, Business day, VanguardPolis Backbone

SV companies /DOS projects who are working in a similar space aka SalesForce and Transparency team (partnerships)

Immediate: MVP--> Prototype that integrates w/ DOS Blackberry Classic and Windows XP... sweat equity FY1: Deployment to 1 Embassy: Travel to Target Embassy, Legal Fees for DOS Cloud Review, 200 contract hours with AI & UIXUXFY2-4: NLP Non-Latin Script- LinguaSys GlobalNLP, Full Time AI expert to perfect contact suggestion, travel for sales/lobbying

Beneficiaries

Mission AchievementMission Budget/Costs

Buy-In/Support

Deployment

Value PropositionKey Activities

Key Resources

Key Partners

CSO: Santiago - Writing report about Boko HaramTyler - Analyzing relationship between known members of BH and unclassified actorsWill Meeker - Travels to Nigeria for 2 years to generate contacts for CSO, get Santiago data

Embassy Staff:LES: Locally engaged staff Caroline: Economic/ Political Officer at small Embassy in stable countryJames/Steve: Economic/ Political Officer at large Embassy in an unstable country Nick: Public Diplomacy Officer at busy Embassy

S/ES& Special ProjectsKapil Gupta: Commitment to show off our demonstrate prototype John Janek:Will send our prototype to Mauritania Embassy friends w/DCM

Foreign Nationals:(OMS): Office Management Specialists and LES To implement and upkeep program at each embassy with updated information about contacts from events/meetings

Individual FSO buy-in

DCM to okay program at 1 embassy as test case and delegate time for FSO’s and LES to test/use

Kapil Gupta: Commitment to show off our demonstrate prototype

CSO Sponsor: Santiago Stocker

IDEO team leader for QDDR

A Dev Garden Consulting: TAP, SBIR, Accelerator/Combinator and Angel Funding consulting, connections, proposal writing

Beta starts in Nigeria Embassy, with Vanguard newspaper(English) and twitter hexagon of Abuja

Target 8 Countries in MENA- Saudi, Israel, Qatar... when NLP+AI perfected, final contract from DOS when product 3.0 ready for world-wide deployment

Need CSO to continue connecting us upstream w/ former clients and downstream with data sources in field

DCM initial support, for 1 or more POL/ECON sections FSO to implement first 10 names that come to mind, LES long term key holders

Source Aggregation: Gives organizations the ability to identify most important actors in rapidly evolving situations using data mined from a breadth of sources.

Hierarchy visualization: ensure people from all backgrounds can analyze and filter relevant data depending on their needs.

Extraction/Suggestion: Perform natural language processing on news articles, twitter and etc to extract categories and information for informal leaders. Suggest novel contacts for each FSO based on known network.

Improve CSO’s ability to write relevant reports by giving them tools for passive “granular” data collection w/o Embassy involvementProvide long-term contact management, node mapping software, hierarchical ranking software, news feed of recent activity of known contacts new contacts discoveryContact suggestion that cuts reliable informant acquisition time in half

Current contact management and information collection

New contact discovery and understanding

Previously published unclassified reports commissioned by DOS

Nigerian news papersgurdian, sahara Times, Punch, Business day, VanguardPolis Backbone

SV companies /DOS projects who are working in a similar space aka SalesForce and Transparency team (partnerships)

Immediate: MVP--> Prototype that integrates w/ DOS Blackberry Classic and Windows XP... sweat equity FY1: Deployment to 1 Embassy: Travel to Target Embassy, Legal Fees for DOS Cloud Review, 200 contract hours with AI & UIXUXFY2-4: NLP Non-Latin Script- LinguaSys GlobalNLP, Full Time AI expert to perfect contact suggestion, travel for sales/lobbying

Value Proposition Extraction/SuggestionsPerform natural language processing on twitter and RSS feeds to extract categories and information for informal leaders. Suggest novel contacts for each FSO based

on known network.

Our Journey

Understand the Real Problem

Proposed an Embassy

Portal

Cable Scraping

Final MVP: Contact

Suggestion

Contact Network

Map

MVP #1 Pivot #1

IDEOAggregates information and facilitates sharing

- AMBITIOUS prototype

IDEO Same conclusion

State Department is in need of contact management solution.

Did IDEO overreach? IDEO wanted to gut and replace entire workflow, instead of addressing specific pain points. What we learned Do not interrupt people’s existing workflow.

1

2

3

Your team learned in 9 weeks what we did in 9

months. ”“

Final MVP: Contact Management & Suggestion

RSSFeeds

Trad.News-Papers

ContactSuggestion

Twitter

Known Contacts

People You Should Connect With

Connect

Rotimi Akeredolu, Governor- Elect of Ondo State

Connect

Betty Akeredolu, founder and president of BRECAN, married to Rotimi Akeredolu

Connect

Simon Lalong, Nigerian lawyer and politician

See More ->

Natural Language Processin

g

https://github.com/USStateDept/Polis

Deploying AggregateDB to Fix Crisis in Algeria

Embassy in Algeria

Shorten to 7 Days using AggregateDB

Diplomat: “Who Do I Talk To?”

Helicopter Companies

Policy Maker: Informed Diplomat

Deploying AggregateDB to Fix Crisis in Algeria

Embassy in Algeria

Shorten to 7 Days using AggregateDB

Diplomat: “Who Do I Talk To?”

Helicopter Companies

Policy Maker: Informed Diplomat

Deploying AggregateDB To Fix Diplomacy Crises

● Deployment to target embassy - Mauritania

● Work w/ IIP for 8 embassy deployment