Dr. Or Sharir

Or Sharir assumes his position in the Faculty of Data and Decision Sciences at Technion–Israel Institute of Technology after a formative decade that took him from theoretical computer science through industry-leading AI research and back to academia. His work involved making powerful machine-learning models that are widely accessible, radically more efficient, and based on sound reasoning about why they should work.

At the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Dr. Sharir’s doctorate in computer science tried to understand why certain neural network architectures are better than others in terms of the complexity of the tasks they can perform versus their overall computational budget.

In parallel with his PhD, Dr. Sharir worked in industry at AI21 Labs, leading several pioneering research and engineering initiatives.

Dr. Sharir’s postdoctoral research at Caltech’s Department of Computing + Mathematical Sciences deepened his exploration of efficiency-driven approaches across machine learning domains from natural language processing to quantum physics. He has formulated influential guidelines for designing more efficient model architectures.

In his lab at Technion, Dr. Sharir focuses on the theoretical and practical aspects of designing more efficient models and algorithms for machine learning, maintaining performance metrics while reducing costs. Given the fast pace of innovation in neural architectures, a robust theoretical foundation for evaluating the strengths and weaknesses of newly proposed architectures can help select which architectures are worth investing in. He hopes to combine his experiences from academia and industry, nurturing a new generation of researchers and practitioners who are skilled in advanced techniques but also mindful of their broader implications.

Dr. Sharir co-founded AAI Technologies, leading the company as it grew into a large, vibrant team focused on next-generation AI systems. The apps he created include one that allows users to share audio stories, another that manages musical chord sheets, and a third that uses augmented reality for interior design projects.