Idiap at a glance
The Idiap Research Institute is among the most active independent research institutions in information technology.
The Idiap Research Institute, based in Martigny (Valais/Switzerland),is a non-profit foundation specialised in the management of multimedia information and man-machine multimodal interactions. Idiap was founded in 1991 by the Town of Martigny, the State of Valais, EPFL (Ecole polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne), the University of Geneva and Swisscom, and is autonomous but connected to EPFL by a joint development plan.
The Idiap budget, which amounts to more than 9 million Swiss francs, is 75% financed by research projects awarded following competitive processes, and 25% by public funds. Whereas it only employed around thirty people in 2001, in 2008 Idiap had around one hundred employees, including 80 researchers (senior researchers, researchers, postdoctoral students and PhD students). All the personnel work at Centre du Parc in Martigny, in the west wing. The institute moved there in August 2007. It now occupies 2,300 m2 of premises over three floors.
Idiap’s main research areas are the following:
- Perceptual and cognitive systems
- Social / human behavior
- Information interfaces and presentation
- Biometric Person Recognition
- Machine learning
- Information Scalable Inference and Decision Systems
Links:
City of Martigny, State of Valais, Swisscom, EPFL, UNIGE Idiap LinkedIn Group (Alumni)
