We recently had the pleasure of welcoming DJ Patil at the BBVA Innovation Center, where he offered us a masterclass on the use of Data and Big Data. This brilliant data scientist has just been appointed the first White House Chief Data Officer in the service of the United States government. Just one more proof that Big Data is not just a passing fad.
The appointment of DJ Patil is a clear indication of the commitment of Barack Obama, the US president, to innovation and enterprise. The former vice president of product at RelatelQ, ex Linkedin, Greylock Partners, Skype, PayPal and eBay has ahead of him a daunting task that will begin with his participation in the administration's initiative on precision medicine, aimed at using data to endow clinics with the best tools, along with the knowledge and therapies to select the most effective treatments for each patient.
From now on, Patil will work shoulder to shoulder with the U.S. director of information and Digital Service with a single goal: to use the new technologies to serve US citizens better.
This is not the first time Barack Obama has shown his support for Big Data. After his first term of office he opted to use Big Data in his 2012 re-election bid, when he included an analytics department in his campaign team to enable them to interpret all the incoming data. After a preliminary analysis, the campaign focused its efforts on three aspects: registration (collecting data from committed voters), persuasion (effectively addressing floating voters) and ensuring the electorate's vote (making sure supporters actually turned out to vote). These analytics allowed the Obama team to optimize communication and improve the response of Democratic voters, while avoiding wasting their resources, time and money on voters who did not support their party.
Obama, after his first term of office he opted to use Big Data in his 2012 re-election bid, included an analytics department in his campaign team to enable them to interpret all the incoming data
Throughout Obama's time in office the US government has also taken major strides forward in innovation and enterprise. Among other actions in this sphere, 138,000 databases have been opened to the public to facilitate the work of entrepreneurs, and there have been improvements to the access and services in the area of citizens' digital personal data.
If you want to take another look at everything DJ Patil taught us at the BBVA Innovation Center, don't miss this video: