The Minister of Communications and Information Technology Amr Talaat has witnessed, via videoconference, the signing of a cooperation agreement between the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology (MCIT) and aiVision French company.
The aim is to implement a Research and Development (R&D) project for the early detection of diabetic retinopathy to avoid vision loss. The project is the first in a series of projects in healthcare and the early detection of diseases.
The signing ceremony was attended by Egypt's Ambassador to France Ihab Badawi. The agreement was signed by the Advisor to the ICT Minister for Artificial Intelligence (AI) Golestan Radwan, and the Founder of aiVision Arnaud Lambert.
Talaat stated that modern technologies, especially AI, can be utilized to develop education and health services, as well as to achieve the desired prosperity. He stressed the significance of cooperation between MCIT and aiVision to capitalize on AI, adding that he looks forward to witness the fruitful results of the cooperation. Negotiations with the French company started with the ICT Minister’s visit to France in September 2019.
The ICT Minister thanked Badawi for his cooperation to help reach this agreement.
Badawi said that there is continuous communication and cooperation between MCIT and the Egyptian Embassy in France, which contributed to stimulating the discussions and developing the partnership with the French company. He underlined the importance of the project that will be implemented in cooperation between MCIT and aiVision, given its importance in protecting patients from blindness.
Radwan stated that the cooperation project aims to provide a deep learning system that is capable of accurately analyzing fundus images to detect early signs of diabetic retinopathy, without the need for a specialist to read the image, thus greatly speeding up the diagnosis and treatment process, giving patients great opportunities to protect their eyesight. The project is implemented through the Applied Innovation Center (AIC), under the supervision of AIC Head Ahmed Tantawi, added Radwan.
For his part, Lambert expressed his pleasure with signing the agreement with MCIT, where the two sides will collaborate in R&D, resulting in the transfer of knowledge in AI. He underscored the importance of the role of AI in serving people, especially in combating blindness.
The innovative retinal diagnostic technology is based on AI to interpret digital images taken for the early detection of major eye diseases. This AI solution provides life science companies with real data to accelerate their research into blindness and eye diseases.
The project will be implemented through technical cooperation between an Egyptian and a French team, where the French knowledge and expertise will be transferred to the Egyptian team.
aiVision is a leading company for AI solutions. It specializes in the medical field, especially in eye diseases diagnosis, and works to provide advanced AI solutions to eliminate the preventable causes of retinal blindness.
