The project: FLAME
Smartocto’s participation in the REACH incubation programme comes in the form of FLAME: federated learning assisting media entities. Federated learning is a machine learning technique that trains central algorithms without exchanging the data. It sends a structured model to a client, and receives a more trained model back, the learnings and refinements of which can be applied to others. This way, all participants can learn from their peers, without giving up their own individual data.
There are a thousand use cases possible with federated learning, but smartocto selected the press agency ecosystem because we know the need here is a pressing one. Press agencies want to optimise their content strategies, their formats and timing, and they also need to have a sense of the impact, reach, engagement and value that their content is achieving.
The issue? Granular data exchanges with clients are considered sensitive.
With federated learning, both client and press agencies can strive for a better fit, without getting entangled in data exchange discussions. We are proud that PA Media and ANP, the press agencies of the UK and the Netherlands will take part in the project.