# Ashwin Ram

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{{Short description|Indian-American computer scientist (born 1960)}}
{{BLP sources|date=August 2009}}
{{Infobox scientist
| name                    = Ashwin Ram
| image                   =
| image_size             = 140px
| caption                 =
| birth_date              = {{birth-date and age|July 27, 1960}}
| birth_place             = New Delhi, India
| death_date              =
| death_place             = 
| field                   = [Artificial intelligence](/source/Artificial_intelligence), [cognitive science](/source/cognitive_science)
| work_institution        = [PARC](/source/PARC_(company)), [Georgia Tech](/source/Georgia_Institute_of_Technology), OpenStudy
| alma_mater              = {{ubl|[Yale University](/source/Yale_University)|[University of Illinois](/source/University_of_Illinois)|[Indian Institute of Technology Delhi](/source/Indian_Institute_of_Technology_Delhi)|[Mayo College](/source/Mayo_College)}}
| doctoral_advisor        = [Roger Schank](/source/Roger_Schank)
| doctoral_students       = <!-- Mark Devaney, Anthony Gerald Francis, Kenneth Moorman, Juan Carlos Santamaria, Michael Thomas Cox, Saurav Sahay, Manish Mehta only if notable or cited -->
| known_for               = 
| prizes                  = 
| footnotes               = 
}}

'''Ashwin Ram''' (born July 27, 1960) is an Indian-American computer scientist. He was [chief innovation officer](/source/chief_innovation_officer) at [PARC](/source/PARC_(company)) from 2011 to 2016, and published books and scientific articles and helped start at least two companies.

==Biography==
Ashwin Ram was born in [New Delhi](/source/New_Delhi), India, on July 27, 1960. He is a great-grandson of Sir [Ganga Ram](/source/Ganga_Ram) and is the eldest of three children. He grew up in New Delhi with a brief stint in Bombay, and attended one of India's oldest boarding schools, [Mayo College](/source/Mayo_College).{{Citation needed |date= August 2013}}

Ram received his B.Tech. in electrical engineering from the [Indian Institute of Technology](/source/Indian_Institute_of_Technology_Delhi), New Delhi, in 1982, where he received the [President of India](/source/President_of_India)'s Gold Medal for best undergraduate performance.
He then traveled to the US, graduating with his M.S. in computer science from the [University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign](/source/University_of_Illinois_at_Urbana-Champaign) in 1984. 
He received his Ph.D. degree from [Yale University](/source/Yale_University) for his dissertation on "Question-Driven Understanding: An Integrated Theory of Story Understanding, Memory, and Learning" in 1989, under advisor [Roger Schank](/source/Roger_Schank)<ref>{{Cite web |title= Question-Driven Understanding: An Integrated Theory of Story Understanding, Memory, and Learning |work= Yale Technical Report 710 |date= May 1989 |url= http://www.cs.yale.edu/publications/techreports/tr710.pdf |access-date= August 23, 2013 }} (Dissertation for Ph.D.)</ref> and Gerald DeJong.<ref>{{cite web |title=Ashwin Ram - The Mathematics Genealogy Project |url=https://www.genealogy.math.ndsu.nodak.edu/id.php?id=78246 |access-date=6 November 2019}}</ref>

===Georgia Tech===
He joined the faculty at the [Georgia Institute of Technology](/source/Georgia_Institute_of_Technology)  (Georgia Tech) in 1989.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Technology Entrepreneur Profile |work=Today's Engineer |date=April 2011 |url=http://www.todaysengineer.org/2011/apr/profile1.asp |access-date=August 23, 2013 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110919092215/http://www.todaysengineer.org/2011/Apr/profile1.asp |archive-date=September 19, 2011 }}</ref>
He was associate professor in the School of [interactive computing](/source/interactive_computing) in the College of Computing, an associate professor of [cognitive science](/source/cognitive_science), an adjunct professor in the School of [Psychology](/source/Psychology), and an adjunct professor in math and computer science at [Emory University](/source/Emory_University).{{When|date=August 2013}}

In 1995 Ram co-edited (with David B. Leake) a book on [goal-oriented](/source/goal-oriented) learning.<ref>{{Cite book |title= Goal-Driven Learning |editor= Ashwin Ram |editor2=David Leake |publisher= MIT Press/Bradford Books |year= 1995 |isbn= 9780262181655 }}</ref>
He co-edited (with Kenneth Moorman) a book on [natural language understanding](/source/natural_language_understanding).<ref>{{Cite book |title= Understanding Language Understanding: Computational Models of Reading |editor= Ashwin Ram |editor2=Kenneth Moorman |publisher= MIT Press/Bradford Books |year= 1998 |isbn= 9780262181921 }}</ref>

Ram founded Enkia Corporation in 1998 (which was purchased by Sentiment360 in 2011).<ref>{{Cite news |title= Northern Ireland Spinoff Buys Georgia Tech Company |work= Global Atlanta |date= January 5, 2011 |author= David Beasley |url= http://www.globalatlanta.com/article/24486/northern-ireland-spinoff-buys-georgia-tech-company/  |access-date= August 23, 2013 }}</ref>
He then co-founded Inquus Corporation, which operated OpenStudy, an online social learning network for students and faculty,<ref>{{Cite web |title= About us |work= OpenStudy web site |url= http://openstudy.com/about-us |access-date= August 23, 2013 }}</ref> and medical information company Cobot Health Corporation.<ref>{{Cite web |title= Cobot Health Corporation |work= Company Overview |publisher= Bloomberg Business Week |url= http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/private/snapshot.asp?privcapId=98341266 |archive-url= https://archive.today/20130823182113/http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/private/snapshot.asp?privcapId=98341266 |url-status= dead |archive-date= August 23, 2013 |access-date= August 23, 2013 }}</ref><!-- defunct? -->
OpenStudy was acquired in 2016 by [Brainly](/source/Brainly).<ref>{{Cite news |title= Social Learning Platform OpenStudy Joins the Brainly Community |work= Press release |date= June 14, 2016 |url= https://finance.yahoo.com/news/social-learning-platform-openstudy-joins-130000652.html |access-date= October 3, 2016 }}</ref>

Ram directed the Cognitive Computing Lab at the [Georgia Institute of Technology](/source/Georgia_Institute_of_Technology) starting around 2006.<ref>{{Cite web |title= People |work= Cognitive Computing Lab website |url= http://home.cc.gatech.edu/ccl/2 |url-status= dead |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20060305115509/http://home.cc.gatech.edu/ccl/2 |archive-date= March 5, 2006 |access-date= August 23, 2013 }}</ref> He led research in [artificial intelligence](/source/artificial_intelligence) (AI) and [cognitive science](/source/cognitive_science). His projects focused on AI for computer games and virtual worlds, consumer health and wellness, and educational technologies. Topics included knowledge-based machine learning, [case-based reasoning](/source/case-based_reasoning), [cognitive model](/source/cognitive_model)ing, and [natural language processing](/source/natural_language_processing).

He was program chair and conference co-chair of the Sixteenth Annual Conference of the [Cognitive Science Society](/source/Cognitive_Science_Society) (CogSci) in 1994,<ref>{{Cite book |title= Proceedings of the Sixteenth Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society |editor= Ashwin Ram |editor2=Kurt Eiselt |publisher= Psychology Press |year= 1994 |isbn= 9780805818031 }}</ref>
conference co-chair of the Third International Conference on the Learning Sciences (ICLS) in 1998,<ref>{{Cite web |title= The Third International Conference on the Learning Sciences |work= Call for papers |year= 1998 |url= http://www.cc.gatech.edu/conferences/icls98/call-for-papers.html |access-date= August 23, 2013 }}</ref>
and program co-chair of the International Conference on Artificial Intelligence and Pattern Recognition in 2008.

===PARC===
Ashwin Ram became an innovation fellow at [PARC](/source/PARC_(company)) (formerly Xerox PARC), around September 2011, and then chief innovation officer.<ref name="parc">{{Cite web|title=Ashwin Ram |work=Corporate profile page |publisher=PARC |url=http://www.parc.com/about/people/2603/ashwin-ram.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111113094620/http://www.parc.com/about/people/2603/ashwin-ram.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=November 13, 2011 |access-date=August 24, 2016 }}</ref>
His team created social computing technologies to augment human cognition in application areas including health and wellness.
He was program co-chair of the International Conference on Case-Based Reasoning (ICCBR) in November 2011, with Nirmalie Wiratunga.<ref>{{Cite book |title= 19th International Conference on Case-Based Reasoning Research and Development |editor= Ashwin Ram |editor2=Nirmalie Wiratunga |publisher= Springer |date= November 2011 |isbn= 9783642232909 }}</ref>
In June 2013, he was interviewed on Australian radio about the trends toward finding medical information on the Internet,<ref>{{Cite web |title= From Dr Google, to Dr Facebook, and beyond... |work= Health Report |publisher= ABC Radio |url= http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/healthreport/from-dr-google2c-to-dr-facebook2c-and-beyond/4760756#transcript |date= June 17, 2013 |access-date= August 23, 2013 }}</ref>
and was invited as a keynote speaker at the Amplify Festival.<ref>{{Cite web|title=The Intelligent Web: Shaping behaviour at the intersection of health, wealth and choice |work=Keynote video |url=http://video.amplifyfestival.com.au/?v=xko1gkxomcbt |archive-url=https://archive.today/20130823202502/http://video.amplifyfestival.com.au/?v=xko1gkxomcbt |url-status=dead |archive-date=August 23, 2013 |access-date=August 23, 2013 }}</ref>

==Amazon==
In May, 2016, he joined the [Amazon Alexa](/source/Amazon_Alexa) development team as head of [artificial intelligence](/source/artificial_intelligence).<ref>{{Cite web |title= Amazon nabs AI boffin from Xerox PARC: Ashwin Ram will lead AI R&D department |url= https://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/05/06/amazon_nabs_ai_boffin_from_xerox_parc/ |date= May 6, 2016 |author= Katyanna Quach |work= The Register |access-date= August 24, 2016 }}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title= Amazon nabs cognitive computing expert Ashwin Ram to head up AI efforts |url= http://siliconangle.com/blog/2016/05/09/amazon-nabs-cognitive-computing-expert-ashwin-ram-to-head-up-ai-efforts/ |date= May 9, 2016 |author= Mike Wheatley |work= Silicon Angle |access-date= August 24, 2016 }}</ref>

==Google==
In 2018 he left Amazon and joined Google as technical director of AI for Google Cloud.<ref>* [https://qz.com/1217188/amazon-alexas-head-ai-researcher-has-left-for-google/ Amazon Alexa’s head AI researcher has left for Google]</ref>

==References==
{{Reflist}}

== External links ==
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20120616060124/http://www.ic.gatech.edu/people/ashwin-ram Ashwin Ram at Georgia Tech]
* [http://cognitivecomputing.wordpress.com Ashwin Ram's Research Blog]

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ram, Ashwin}}
Category:Living people
Category:1960 births
Category:American computer scientists
Category:Indian cognitive scientists
Category:Georgia Tech faculty
Category:Yale University alumni
Category:Artificial intelligence researchers
Category:IIT Delhi alumni
Category:Scientists at PARC (company)
Category:Indian emigrants to the United States
Category:American academics of Indian descent
Category:People from New Delhi

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Adapted from the Wikipedia article [Ashwin Ram](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashwin_Ram) by Wikipedia contributors ([contributor history](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashwin_Ram?action=history)). Available under [Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/). Changes may have been made.