Private AI Collaborative Research Institute: Project Partners, Universities, and Countries

The Private AI Collaborative Research Institute was launched by Intel in collaboration with Avast and Borsetta to advance privacy and trust technologies for decentralized artificial intelligence (AI)2356. The Institute supports fundamental research and real-world applications, focusing on secure, decentralized analytics and compute at the edge.

Founding and Core Industry Partners

Role	Company/Organization	Country
Lead/Initiator	Intel (University Research & Collaboration Office)	USA
Co-founder	Avast	Czech Republic/UK (global)
Co-founder	Borsetta	USA

Key Academic Partners and Research Projects

The Institute selected the first nine research projects at eight leading universities worldwide, each led by prominent principal investigators:

University	Principal Investigator(s)	Country	Project/Focus Area
Carnegie Mellon University (CMU)	Virginia Smith	USA	Unified framework for robust, privacy-preserving federated learning
University of California, San Diego (UCSD)	Farinaz Koushanfar	USA	Private decentralized analytics on the edge (PriDEdge); cryptographic hardware primitives
University of Southern California (USC)	Salman Avestimehr, Murali Annavaram	USA	Secure and privacy-preserving machine learning using trusted execution environments
University of Toronto	Nicolas Papernot	Canada	Cryptography in privacy-preserving machine learning
University of Waterloo	N. Asokan	Canada	Confidence in distributed AI systems; leakage-resistant aggregation, side-channel-resistant hardware
Technical University of Darmstadt (TU Darmstadt)	Thomas Schneider, Ahmad-Reza Sadeghi	Germany	Engineering private AI systems (EPAI, ENCRYPTO); decentralized trustworthy federated learning (TRUFFLE)
University of Würzburg	Alexandra Dmitrienko	Germany	Decentralized trustworthy federated learning (TRUFFLE)
Université Catholique de Louvain (UCLouvain)	Axel Legay, Thomas Given-Wilson	Belgium	Federated private learning on heterogeneous devices, malware detection
National University of Singapore (NUS)	Reza Shokri	Singapore	Robust, privacy-preserving knowledge transfer for decentralized learning

Research Focus and Technology Areas

• Decentralized and Federated Learning: Secure, privacy-preserving AI model training across distributed, heterogeneous devices and data silos.

• Cryptography and Hardware Security: Hardware-based cryptographic primitives, trusted execution environments, side-channel resistance.

• Privacy Engineering: Differential privacy, privacy-enhancing technologies, secure multi-party computation.

• Malware Detection and Trust: Secure aggregation, watermarking, and robust model design for adversarial environments.

• Knowledge Transfer and Scalability: Efficient, privacy-preserving knowledge sharing in heterogeneous, decentralized networks.
  

Countries Involved

• USA: Intel (lead), Carnegie Mellon University, University of California San Diego, University of Southern California, Borsetta

• Czech Republic/UK: Avast (global HQ in Czech Republic, listed in UK)

• Canada: University of Toronto, University of Waterloo

• Germany: Technical University of Darmstadt, University of Würzburg

• Belgium: Université Catholique de Louvain

• Singapore: National University of Singapore
  

Summary Table: Project Ecosystem

Role/Type	Organization/University	Country
Lead Industry	Intel	USA
Co-founder	Avast	Czech Rep/UK
Co-founder	Borsetta	USA
Academic Partner	Carnegie Mellon University	USA
Academic Partner	University of California, San Diego	USA
Academic Partner	University of Southern California	USA
Academic Partner	University of Toronto	Canada
Academic Partner	University of Waterloo	Canada
Academic Partner	Technical University of Darmstadt	Germany
Academic Partner	University of Würzburg	Germany
Academic Partner	Université Catholique de Louvain	Belgium
Academic Partner	National University of Singapore	Singapore

Main Goals of the Private AI Collaborative Research Institute

The Private AI Collaborative Research Institute, launched by Intel in partnership with Avast and Borsetta, is dedicated to advancing technologies that strengthen privacy, security, and trust for decentralized artificial intelligence (AI). Its primary goals are:

• Develop Privacy- and Trust-Enhancing Technologies for Decentralized AIThe Institute aims to enable AI systems that operate at the network edge-on devices rather than in centralized data centers-while ensuring privacy and trustworthiness in analytics and computation1236.
  

• Overcome the Limitations of Centralized AI ApproachesThe Institute focuses on five critical obstacles faced by centralized AI, with the goal of building decentralized, secure, and efficient AI systems1356:
  

  • Data Silos: Most data is privacy-sensitive, decentralized, and cannot be moved to the cloud. The Institute seeks to enable AI training and analytics without requiring data centralization.

  • Security Risks: Centralized training is vulnerable to attacks and requires a single trusted data center. The Institute aims to develop frameworks for secure, decentralized training among untrusted participants.

  • Model Obsolescence: Centralized models often become outdated quickly due to infrequent retraining. The Institute supports research into continuous and differential retraining in decentralized settings.

  • Resource Constraints: Centralized computing is costly and limited by communication and latency. The Institute promotes efficient, distributed compute at the edge.

  • Federated Learning Limitations: While federated learning allows some edge data usage, it cannot always guarantee privacy and security. The Institute seeks to advance federated and decentralized learning that is robust and privacy-preserving.
    

• Promote Ethical, Human-Centric AIThe Institute is committed to developing AI technologies using ethical principles that put people first, aiming to keep individuals safe and secure and to reflect human-driven values in AI systems1245.
  

• Encourage Industry-Academic CollaborationBy bringing together leading universities and private sector partners, the Institute fosters a collaborative research environment to accelerate the development of privacy-focused machine learning and real-world solutions for society245.
  

• Liberate Data from Silos While Maintaining Efficiency and PrivacyThe Institute’s vision is to enable organizations to analyze and utilize data that would otherwise remain inaccessible due to privacy or regulatory constraints, without compromising efficiency or user trust123.
  

In summary:The main goals of the Private AI Collaborative Research Institute are to develop foundational technologies for secure, privacy-preserving, and trustworthy decentralized AI; overcome the key limitations of centralized AI (data silos, security, model staleness, resource costs, and federated learning weaknesses); promote ethical AI; and foster collaboration between industry and academia to solve real-world challenges in privacy and AI123456.

Citations:

1. https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/research/blogs/private-ai-collaborative-research-institute-launch.html

2. https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/avast-and-borsetta-join-intel-in-launching-the-private-ai-collaborative-research-institute-301186100.html

3. https://www.private-ai.org

4. https://blog.avast.com/private-ai-research-institute-avast

5. https://aithority.com/security/avast-and-borsetta-join-intel-in-launching-the-private-ai-collaborative-research-institute/

6. https://se.informatik.uni-wuerzburg.de/secure-software-systems-group/projects/private-ai-collaborative-research-institute/

7. https://newsroom.gendigital.com/2020-12-03-Avast-and-Borsetta-Join-Intel-in-Launching-the-Private-AI-Collaborative-Research-Institute

8. https://www.ml.cmu.edu/news/news-archive/2016-2020/2020/december/machine-learning-prof-virginia-smith-joins-private-ai-collaborative-research-institute-intel.html

9. https://www.informatik.tu-darmstadt.de/systemsecurity/research_sys/centers_sys/index.en.jsp

10. https://www.ai21.com/private-ai/

Answer from Perplexity: pplx.ai/share

Conclusion

The Private AI Collaborative Research Institute is a global initiative led by Intel, Avast, and Borsetta, with research projects at top universities in the USA, Canada, Germany, Belgium, and Singapore. The Institute brings together expertise in AI, cybersecurity, cryptography, hardware, and privacy engineering to address the challenges of decentralized, privacy-preserving AI2356810.

Citations:

1. https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/research/blogs/private-ai-collaborative-research-institute-launch.html

2. https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/research/blogs/private-ai-collaborative-research-institute-launch.html

3. https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/research/blogs/private-ai-collaborative-research-institute-launch.html

4. https://newsroom.gendigital.com/2020-12-03-Avast-and-Borsetta-Join-Intel-in-Launching-the-Private-AI-Collaborative-Research-Institute

5. https://www.med.uni-wuerzburg.de/en/ccc/aktuelles/single/news/intel-launches-private-ai-collaborative-research-institute/

6. https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/news/ai-collaborative-research/

7. https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/avast-and-borsetta-join-intel-in-launching-the-private-ai-collaborative-research-institute-301186100.html

8. https://www.ec-mea.com/dubai-internet-city-to-welcome-intels-first-ai-software-rd-center-in-the-gcc/

9. https://www.schunter.org/blog/2020/03/11/launch-of-the-private-ai-center/

10. https://tadviser.com/index.php/Article:Research_and_development_centers_of_Intel

11. https://jacobsschool.ucsd.edu/news/release/3175

12. https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/jobs/locations.html

13. https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/research/responsible-ai-research.html

14. https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/corporate-responsibility/community-global-sites.html

15. https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/research/security.html

16. https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/research/ai.html

17. https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/research/blogs/top-10-intel-labs-blogs-2020.html

18. https://jobs.intel.com/en/locations

19. https://www.intc.com/news-events/press-releases/detail/1660/intel-labs-to-present-industry-leading-ai-research-at

20. https://www.intel.la/content/www/xl/es/research/blogs/top-10-intel-labs-blogs-2020.html

21. https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/research/partnerships.html

22. https://www.thenationalnews.com/business/technology/2022/10/12/intel-to-open-ai-research-centre-at-dubai-internet-city/

Answer from Perplexity: pplx.ai/share