Technology company and two Portuguese universities open AI hub
Closer Consulting will open a new AI hub in the first half of the year, as part of a partnership with Nova SBE and the Faculty of Sciences, with centres in Lisbon, Porto and Braga.
Portuguese technology company Closer Consulting plans to open a new artificial intelligence (AI) research and development hub in the first half of this year, with three centres, in a partnership with the Faculty of Sciences of the University of Lisbon and the Faculty of Economics of the New University of Lisbon (Nova SBE).
“The group decided to create an artificial intelligence research and development hub in Portugal, which will serve all our clients from a nearshore perspective. It’s a project that will have three hubs: in Lisbon, Braga and Porto”, Fernando Matos, partner and co-founder of Closer Consulting, which specialises in data science and has a “strong presence” in sectors such as banking, telecommunications, energy and retail, told ECO.
According to Matos, the aim is to have 300 people working in this hub within three years. Some of these workers will be professionals who are already working for Closer Consulting, others will be recent graduates, others will be doctoral students at the referred universities and others will be professionals recruited with different levels of experience.
“It’s going to be a hub that will focus a lot on academia”, emphasised Fernando Matos, insisting that there will be a direct link between the technology company and the two faculties.
The opening date has yet to be finalised, but the partner assures us that it will be in the first half of this year: “The opening is coming soon. We want it to be as soon as possible to have an impact on our business.”
As well as the link to academia, the project will be supported with European funds. Fernando Matos explains that he has already had several meetings with the Ministry of the Economy and AICEP. “It’s going to be a project with the support of these organisations”, he said.
An academy to “fish” for talent
As it prepares to open its new AI hub, Closer Consulting is also about to launch another edition of Data Academy, an intensive training programme for young talent.
The 11th edition kicks off in April and will offer participants, as before, a remuneration. “People have six weeks of intensive training and then start working on our projects”, explained Fernando Matos, guaranteeing that the integration rate is not far off 100%.
Most of the trainees are recent graduates, “but that’s not a rule”. He added that there have also been cases of requalification, i.e. people who come from other areas but, through this programme, end up gaining the skills to pursue a career in analytics.
Exceptions aside, the Data Academy is generally aimed at recent graduates in Physics, Maths and Computer Engineering. “The academy was structured for people with little or no experience who end up having training with different modules, from hard to soft skills”, he emphasised.
With ten editions already completed, the Data Academy has been a success in attracting talent, added Fernando Matos, recalling that, at the beginning, it was necessary to go “fishing” for candidates. Now, there are around three hundred applications: “It makes selection more difficult, we have had some excellent candidates”.
With 350 professionals and offices in Portugal, Brazil and the UK, Closer Consulting is currently part of the French group Smart4Engineering.
