Cooperation with HSLU students for industry projects and for the exchange of artificial intelligence know-how

The AI/ML bachelor’s program partners with companies and public institutions (Local AI Community (LAC) and Applied AI Center) to advance research and development in the field. We use different channels to transfer our knowledge and expertise from research to the business and industry sectors. In doing so, we support partner companies with whom we jointly develop customized solutions for specific issues in the fields of data science, machine learning, and AI.

The opportunities for cooperation are outlined in the table below. In the “Challenge faced by company” column, you can find the issues that most affect you and under “Our solution”, how we might be able to help you solve them.

1. Challenge faced by company: Hiring is expensive and takes time. Your business is too complex for consultants/ contractors to understand.

• Our solution: PiBS – practice-integrated bachelor’s program
• Company benefits: Train your own future AI experts who are familiar with your company, culture, and team.
• Duration: Four years

2. Challenge faced by company: You want to upskill your workforce for AI and machine learning

• Our solution: Part-time study track
• Company benefits: By letting your workforce (i.e., the people you already know and trust) gain skills and knowledge in AI/ML, you can scale your business.
• Duration: Four years

3. Challenge faced by company: You are unsure how AI might be used in your business. You might have some tentative ideas, but no resources or budget to test them.

• Our solution: Bachelor’s projects
• Company benefits: Supervised by experts, our students can prototype and proof-of-concept your ideas
• Duration: Three months

Click on the links above and learn more about how we collaborate with companies and institutions and share our expertise and access to our research and development infrastructure to ensure the transfer of knowledge and technology.
We will be happy to talk to you in person and help you develop the perfect solution for you.

Our Bachelor’s in AI and Machine Learning program is the first of its kind in Switzerland. Each semester, we have dozens of skilled and motivated students looking to work with industry partners for three to four months before graduating. 
To give you an idea of what is possible, we have compiled a list of our students’ AI projects in 2023:

Finance and commerce
- Demand forecasting for supermarkets
- algorithmic trading
- insight engine for private equity investments

Industry and manufacturing
- Object detection for augmented reality
- Optimizing energy use in buildings
- Warehouse inventory optimization
- Recognition of people in robotics safety applications
- Automating coding and software engineering with LLMs
- Computer vision for maintenance robots
- Anomaly detection for predictive machine maintenance

Marketing and media
- Improving marketing content in blogs
- Chatbot solution for call center automation
- Chatbot that understands and summarizes conversations
- Language model that understands the attitudes underlying a tex
- Intelligent query engine for proprietary document collections
- Data journalism and data-driven storytelling
- Exploiting language models for document collections

Leisure and tourism
- Planning of sports tournaments schedules
- Recommender system for local tourism
- Automation of sports event commentary

Medicine and health
- Diagnosis of brain conditions with medical imagery
- Health applications for personal electronic devices

• What is PiBS?
  PiBS is a program for students who have recently finished their academic baccalaureate in Switzerland and have no prior work experience. The student will work between 0.4 and 0.6 FTEs with your company for four years while studying in the AI/ML bachelor’s program, where they develop advanced skills and become part of your company while learning state-of-the-art in AI and ML technologies. This can help reduce recruitment time and costs for your company and allow you to scale your AI projects with the help of an emerging in-house expert.
• Can the student work and study full-time for six months each instead?
  No, the student must work and study at the same time. Working hours must be between 0.4 and 0.6 FTEs.
  Do you have a contract template or guidelines?
  No, you are free to use you own standard contracts.
• How much should we pay the student?
  The minimum wage (1.0 FTE) for a student is CHF 2,303 per month (or 2,359 from 1.1.2024) (Source: L-GAV only German). 
  What is the required contract period?
  Given the students study for four years, you are encouraged to give them a four-year contract. However, a sequence of four renewable one-year contracts is also acceptable.
• What are “bachelor’s projects”?
  The bachelor's thesis is the student's final project and therefore takes place in the last semester of the bachelor's degree programs. The duration of a bachelor's thesis is typically 15 to 16 weeks, with a 360-hours workload per student. Work may start in the spring semester (week 8) or in the autumn semester (week 38). Each student works on a separate project.
• How many bachelor’s projects can I commission?
  As many as you want. For each student you must provide a project idea, data, and support.
• What is the skills level of students working on a bachelor’s project?
  The students are in the final semester of their bachelor’s program. This means they have typically taken all courses and are fully trained.
  Is work on the bachelor’s thesis supervised?
  Yes. A lecturer from the HSLU with the necessary expertise will supervise the student. Moreover, students also have access to a wide range of experts who work in research at the HSLU.
• What kind of output can I expect?
  Please note that actual product development is too extensive a task for a bachelor’s thesis. This means that the project generally will not conclude with a finished product, but with a prototype or a concept. Student software projects, for example, are ideal to demonstrate feasibility in principle by developing an idea or novel technology as a prototype, which can then be further developed by the client.