In the year since Intel launched the Pandemic Response Technology Initiative (PRTI), a $50m commitment to use technology to combat the effects of Covid-19, it has grown to include 230 projects spread across 170 organisations.

The initiative sought to provide a 360-degree view of the challenges ahead, focusing on how technologies can enhance healthcare, education and the economic recovery of businesses at multiple levels.

“Our goals were to provide immediate relief where it was needed most, develop innovations to support the new normal and invest in technology that would limit the impact of future crises,” said Rick Echevarria, vice president at Intel and PRTI leader. “Nearly every piece of Intel technology was leveraged in some way. We’ve partnered with organisations around the world to apply our expertise to geographically unique problems as well as global challenges, and we don’t want to stop.”

Aligned with Intel’s Rise 2030 goals, the company is transitioning this process and the technical expertise of its employee volunteers to the Intel Rise Technology Initiative (IRTI). The IRTI will continue to review and fund projects related to healthcare, education and the economy with dedicated workstreams for social equity and human rights, accessibility, and climate action.

IRTI aims to create a broader, purpose-driven platform for action with a new $20m commitment.

“We’re excited to share more about those projects throughout the year,” said Echevarria. “For now, our work with the PRTI offers a glimpse at what can be achieved through technology, strategic partnerships and a collective desire to do good.”

He said the challenges of the healthcare industry were innumerable.

He said: “When assessing projects, how do you choose between helping patients, assisting medical staff, funding life-saving research or making sense of massive amounts of unstructured patient data? We wanted to ensure we were tapping into the full breadth of Intel’s portfolio to provide support and make a lasting difference.”

The PRTI worked with partners across the healthcare space, from universities and hospitals to equipment manufacturers and infrastructure partners, to increase its impact at every level.

In early 2020, there was a huge shortage of polymerase chain reaction tests, which are critical to the analysis and identification of infectious agents. Intel partners in the medical imaging space stepped up to use CT and X-ray scanning machines to help diagnose and triage patients with Covid-19.

Using artificial intelligence (AI), these machines were able to determine the presence and severity of Covid-19 and facilitate a treatment plan when tests weren’t readily available. This paved the way for organisations to create diverse datasets for more accurate diagnoses. UC San Francisco leveraged Intel SGX to deploy a confidential computing platform that will help protect both the algorithms and privacy of healthcare data when building AI models.

Telehealth enabled access to medical care while reducing the risk for patients and clinicians. Intel worked with Banner Health and VeeMed to augment in-room displays with Intel NUC Mini PCs running telehealth software. Providers and specialists were able to consult on Covid-19 cases, and medical staff could remotely speak to patients, log data from in-room monitors and even zoom in to check a patient’s vitals.

Projects targeted patient and provider needs along with work in research and therapeutic development. This included partnering with users to provide high performance compute (HPC) resources for Covid-19 research as well as research projects that go beyond the current pandemic. The Berlin Institute of Health leveraged Intel-based HPC architecture to perform compute-intensive RNA sequencing on a single-cell level to understand how the novel coronavirus worked.

“The immediate needs in the education space during the pandemic were very clear,” said Echevarria. “Children needed devices and connectivity to stay in school. As we worked to provide devices to students, we learned that focusing on connectivity alone would be a maintenance-only solution. We wanted students to actually advance. We partnered with schools, ecosystem partners, local governments, teachers and device manufacturers to make a difference.”

The PRTI engaged in many opportunities to distribute laptops and bolster connectivity in communities around the world. The Intel Online Learning Initiative served a million students globally. In the USA, it focused in the areas of most need, providing remote learning to students in more than 15,000 families representing 45 school districts that serve title-one students in the USA.

Among the students awarded were cadets from the Airforce JROTC programme at Aberdeen High School in Mississippi, which offers a gateway to advanced placement computer science education.

Through work with the LA Unified School District, Intel learned that 30% of students who were able to connect while distance learning would switch off.

“We realised the need to develop educational materials that keep students engaged,” said Echevarria.

A partnership with Houston Space Center created a public programme around Nasa’s Artemis mission to the moon in 2024. A group of 500 educators engaged in the deployment of virtual learning experiences about the next manned moon mission. The project will include future Nasa missions, too.

One of the most exciting education projects focused on the crucial emotional support teachers provide. District Zero is a Chicago-based company that focuses on wellness-based learning. Using natural-language processing and sentiment analysis, District Zero’s emotional learning tool gives teachers actionable insights to help students who may be struggling. With Intel’s support, the company will deploy its system for all students in the Indian Prairie School District that serves 30,000 students from areas outside just outside of Chicago.

“Throughout the year, we looked at multiple factors contributing to the economic downturn,” said Echevarria. “The common theme was safety, whether it’s developing solutions that make it safe for businesses to open, minimising the risk to patrons or investing in solutions that help deliver a more resilient economy when the next global health crisis occurs.”

Citywide quarantines and stay-at-home orders were a last resort designed to stop the spread of contagious disease, but even with these protective measures in place, businesses need to open safely to serve essential needs. The PRTI invested in several projects designed to make buildings safer during the pandemic, including AI-enabled occupancy and social distancing controls with Johnson Controls. This includes human observation monitoring of social distancing for environmental data and sensors to optimise air quality and physical distancing analysis.

Helping businesses adapt to facilitate essential activities is key to economic recovery. While movement and travel were greatly limited by the pandemic, they cannot be eliminated completely. GE Digital Aviation Software developed a predictive maintenance application for cabin air quality to help airline carriers proactively monitor the health of air quality systems on their flights.

Investing offers a degree of resilience against the future spread of disease and pandemics. With funding from Intel, Purdue University is developing autonomous robots that can detect pathogens and disinfect within seconds. Two functional robots already exist and are being tested in Purdue Covid-19 quarantine rooms and classrooms. Six patents later, the college is moving towards commercialisation opportunities. The hope is that this work will help make public spaces safer and reduce exposure risk in high-traffic hot zones for pathogens.

“Key to the success of the PRTI projects are the scores of Intel experts working with partners to understand the heart of the issues and provide tailored solutions that yield real results,” said Echevarria. “The work has already started with the IRTI, and we’re looking forward to sharing more throughout the year.”