AJN MAY 22, 2020 10 IYAR 28, 5780 NEWS A START-UP

trying to slow down COVID-19

In his early 20s, Anthony Goldbloom created tech start-up in his Melbourne bedroom. He relayed his journey to Shane Desiatnik explaining how it has grown to a -acquired company with millions of users around the world, and its latest work assisting the White House to analyse COVID-19 research findings.

IA a Google Meet hook-up from or organisations set to benefit. “That made it a lot easier to get more “I also enjoy seeing the discussions his San Francisco home earlier this Anthony, who made Forbes’ ‘Top 30 major customers, so in 2012 I moved that are going on in our online forums. month, 37-year-old Kaggle founder Under 30 in Technology’ list in 2011 with my wife to the Silicon Valley to raise “We also have ‘grandmasters’ – about and CEO Anthony Goldbloom and 2012, recalled how after completing further capital and grow the business.” 180 of them worldwide – who are shed light on his remarkable entre- high school at Bialik College, he stud- respected as the people with the highest preneurial journey from being a ied econometrics at the Universityversity of RISING TO THE rankings. V young IT (information technol- Melbourne and became fascinatedted byby thethe “I“I sometimessometimes argue ogy) enthusiast to creating and guiding potential of AI for data analysisis to solvesolve CCHALLENGEHALLENGE that these comcompe-pe- the largest community of data scientists problems for business. AnthonyAnthony saidsaid tthehe nextnext titions are kind and machine-learning specialists on the “My first jobs were at the AAustralianustralian step was “w“whenhen we startestartedd ofof like a sportsport planet. Treasury in Canberra and thenthen ththee runningrunning machine-learningmachine-learning – butbut forfor datadata “The Kaggle website basically started Reserve Bank of Australia inn Sydney,Sydney, or AI comcompetitionspetitions and sscientists!”cientists!” in my bedroom in Melbourne in my early basically doing statistical modelling.lling. challenges,challenges, and built a AAnthonynthony 20s, and now it has 4.5 million users, “I started hacking around witwithh tthehe tooltool that data scientistsscientists sasaidid oonene ofof which certainly feels nice,” Anthony said. idea for Kaggle in my sparee time atat and AI people could use ththee bbestest ppiecesieces “That’s clearly a high proportion of night, initially, and then I decidedecided ttoo to shareshare ttheirheir wworkork wiwithth of aadvicedvice foforr the people who work in AI (artificial leave my job in 2009 to start workingorking on eacheach otother”.her”. eentrepreneursntrepreneurs intelligence).” it full time back in Melbourne. ““ThatThat reallyreally hhelpedelped us that he’s come In a nutshell, Kaggle – which was “It was a pretty good time too do that, toto grow,grow, and create a deddedi-i- acacrossross is “to acquired by Google in a multi-million because there was an emergingg intereinterestst cated KaKaggleggle communitycommunity to bbuilduild somethingsomething dollar deal in 2017 – is a platform that in data analysis and it was certainlycertainly start developingdeveloping solutions to that you would like brings together and provides incentives something I was very interestedd in.”in.” all sorts of pproblems.roblems. ttoo use personapersonallylly – for its members to create algorithms that After launching in 2010, KaggKaggle’sle’s ““TheThe competitions are very anandd I lloveove pplay-lay- solve complex problems for the business, main function was providing datadata anal-anal- exciting to watchwatch becausebecause ttherehere ing witwithh our government, research and development, ysis services and its early customersmers were is prize money, andand therethere is a lliveive and healthcare sectors. mostly academic researchers. leaderboardleaderboard so thatthat peoplepeople The reason why it became so suc- The company’s breakthroughugh camecame can see hhowow tthey’rehey’re performingp erforming cessful is its unique format of using when it secured as customersrs one ofof relativer e l ative problem-solving competitions and chal- America’s biggest insurance compa-compa- toto eaceachh lenges – complete with point rankings, nies called All State, and giantgiant UK other.other. and prize money provided by companies supermarket chain Tesco. Anthony Goldbloom

MAY 22, 2020 AJN NEWS IYAR 28, 5780 11

Anthony with his daughter Annabel in December 2017 during a visit by his mum Deena and grandfather Mark, who passed away a few months later.

Anthony Goldbloom speaking to data scientists at a 2019 Kaggle Days conference in San Francisco. At Lvov railway station with his grandparents in 2009.

product, and it turns out that 4.5 million cles with research findings about all aspects surface, or what strength of evidence is tenacity they showed not only by surviving other Kaggle users do too”. of the virus so far, and previous studies available for hypertension being a risk factor the Holocaust, but picking up afterwards about a range of coronaviruses. – these are just some examples. and building amazing lives for themselves in CHALLENGES THAT Anthony said it became clear when “Unfortunately, AI is not at the point yet Australia, and then for us. the amount of new research papers about where you can throw it papers and get it to “Both of them have passed away, but I STAND OUT COVID-19 rapidly rose – from about 20 per give you a summary of results – it needs a bit really admire the example that they set – it’s Anthony said he is proud of what Kaggle month in February to about 200 per day by more human hand-holding. something I to live up to.” has achieved so far, and becomes “most early April – that it could become extremely “But things have gone quite well so During the Second World War they were proud when we’re at the beginning of a challenging, or near impossible, to analyse far, and we’re making a contribution to living in Lvov, which was then in Poland but project in a new area of AI machine learning and utilise all this information. is now part of Ukraine. hopefully putting more good evidence out that has vast potential”. Anthony revealed that when he’d quit Two examples stand out in his mind. his job at the Reserve Bank in July 2009, “In 2015 we ran a challenge organised he went on a month-long ‘family roots’ trip by the California Healthcare Foundation to We’re making a contribution to hopefully putting more good with his grandparents to Lvov, and it was take images of an eye disease called diabetic immediately upon his return that he set up retinopathy, which helped to demonstrate evidence out there for the healthcare, health policy and Kaggle. that some of the advances in machine learn- research sectors so they are able to make more evidence- “That inspirational experience helped the ing that had happened in the previous three challenges I was about to face seem relatively years were capable of starting to do really based decisions. more simple,” he said. high-quality work to augment or help with “No business journey is an easy one – medical diagnosis. Anthony Goldbloom there are lots of issues along the way to “That is now one of the really hot success. areas of AI and machine learning applied “So I draw a lot of inspiration from that there for the healthcare, health policy and to radiology – using US Food and Drug “There’s a lot of open questions that sci- tenacity my grandparents showed in surviv- research sectors so they are able to make Administration-approved algorithms. entists are trying to answer about the virus, ing something dramatically more challeng- more evidence-based decisions.” “So it’s kind of cool to be on the front and nobody can read 200 studies per day, ing than anything I’ve ever been through. end of that.” but fortunately all the research papers in the “It makes the barriers I’ve had to break And just earlier this year, Anthony said [COVID-19 Open Research] Dataset are THE SOURCE OF through in my business life seem much more Kaggle wrapped up a project called ‘Deep machine readable, so you can run algorithms INSPIRATION tractable.” Fakes’, in close collaboration with Facebook, to mine the key data – like an AI-powered The vice-principal of Bialik College, Gary with the objective of finding ways to detect literature review. When asked if he drew on his Jewish Velleman, recalls Anthony’s “passion for whether a video posted online contains real “So I think the reason the White House heritage, upbringing or values much when mathematics and thinking laterally was evi- or fake footage. approached us to help is because if you want navigating through his Kaggle journey, dent from his childhood and teenage years”, “Videos that are generated algorithmically to find the AI community, there’s no larger Anthony’s reply was clear – “definitely”. when he was a student at the Jewish school. can make it look like or simulate someone, concentration anywhere than Kaggle. “I’m very inspired by my grandparents’ “Bialik is proud of Anthony’s achieve- for example, like Donald Trump or Barack “It was the most efficient way, and they generation – particularly my maternal grand- ments and contributions, especially at this Obama, say something they didn’t say. wanted to make sure these useful data sets parents Mark and Anita Wayne – for the time.” “The prize money for that competition weren’t just sitting there, but could be actu- was $1 million, so there was a lot of interest. ally utilised.” “I’m excited by that because, while it has The same successful Kaggle system of not had a huge impact yet, it is something setting its users challenges and competitions that is at its beginnings. to solve problems is being used. “So my hope is that challenge, in a way One challenge aims to answer a set of like the radiology example before it, is simi- nine key questions using natural language larly at the cutting edge of an area that ends processing; one asks data scientists to predict up really becoming a meaningful part of the number of cases and fatalities between what we use AI for.” cities to help explain differences in local transmission rates; another uses exploratory analysis to answer research questions that HELPING THE WHITE directly support frontline responders. HOUSE HARNESS Anthony said just over six per cent so far of all of the available scientific literature has COVID-19 RESEARCH already been “mined” for the most relevant Since February this year, the White and useful information by the Kaggle com- House Office of Science and Technology munity. and a coalition of leading research organisa- “Everything from knowing how long tions began compiling a COVID-19 Open the incubation period of the virus is in dif- Research Dataset. ferent locations – which dictates how long It’s become a massive, freely available quarantine periods should be – to knowing Anthony addresses an Australian Friends of Tel Aviv University and Melbourne University dinner resource of more than 50,000 scholarly arti- how long the virus persists on a particular event in 2018. Photo: Peter Haskin