St. Petersburg data startup PVM is partnering with a University of South Florida-hosted flood research program to improve its data management and procedures.
PVM, housed at the St. Petersburg Maritime and Defense Technology Hub, is an information technology and services company for data projects. It has partnered with USF's Florida Flood Hub for Applied Research and Innovation to improve and prepare the hub's research. These improvements will include a new data infrastructure to organize and add efficiencies to the state-funded project.
The partnership also will enhance accessibility for technologies like generative artificial intelligence and machine learning, CEO and founder Pat Mack told Tampa Bay Inno.
The Florida State Legislature created the Flood Hub in 2022 with $20 million in state funds. USF's College of Marine Science on its St. Petersburg campus is the official host of the operation, but it is temporarily located at the St. Petersburg Maritime and Defense Technology Hub because of construction.
As the hub developed and sought progress, it evaluated and decided to partner under contract with PVM. USF has approved PVM as a vendor for the university, Mack said.
"The research that is being done by the Florida Flood Hub for Applied Research and Innovation really lends itself well to some of the tools and some of the knowledge that we've developed," Mack said.
PVM holds several state and local relationships, Mack said. It previously worked on government contracts with entities like the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the National Science Foundation. As a Palantir services provider, PVM contracts with customers to help fix problems in their data management systems, according to PVM's website.
With the Flood Hub, PVM plans first to identify how to build the new infrastructure and provide a proof of concept. Mack will study the data framework and come up with a plan to evolve the system in the following three fiscal quarters. It will organize and structure the system in new ways to make the data management, repository and system shareable with researchers.
"The idea behind that is, as the system collects near real-time data, and the models identify potential risk areas, that we use artificial intelligence to help decision makers refine those forecasts, share that information with others and take steps in accordance with whatever their policies and procedures are to minimize that damage," Mack said.
It's marrying contemporary data and marine science technologies with a system intended for future understanding and decision-making during floods, Mack said.
