“A unique part of working at IMDEA Networks is that the research environment is very open”

Get to know better our Research Assistant Professor in this first part of the interview given by the leader of the Edge Networks Group

04 May 2021

Jaya Champati, Research Assistant Professor at IMDEA Networks, is the head of the Edge Networks Group. He is interested in decision making, learning, resource allocation/scheduling problems that arise in networking and information systems, in general. In this interview, he tells us what he likes the most about IMDEA Networks and talks about his career path. He will speak about his main lines of research in a future installment and what he expects to accomplish.

Why did you decide to join IMDEA Networks?

I visited the institute last year and it gave me the impression that is dynamic and has a very good work culture. I was particularly excited by the cutting-edge research done by the Faculty and the students in networking, wireless communications, and data science and saw the prospect of closely working with the researchers. So, when I was offered a position at IMDEA, I had to choose it over the other offers. Another important factor is that the salary offered by IMDEA is quite competitive.

Last but not least, Madrid is a great city to live in with its year-round sunny weather and friendly people.

What are the keys of working at this institute?

IMDEA is a small research institute, so a unique part of working here is that you can talk to almost all the people at the institute, the research environment is very open and people are open-minded.

My colleagues especially are very passionate and ambitious about what they are doing. So I really enjoy the interactions with them so far, knowing what they are doing, and also they are open-minded even it comes to looking at the problems I am working on. So that clearly gives me a nice start to have future collaborations.

What impact has your experience working abroad had in your career?

My experience in India, Canada, and Stockholm (in Sweden) have been invaluable to me as I learned so much in these research environments and I also adopted the best practices from them.

For example, during my master’s in India in IIT (Bombay), I learned what research means. It is about finding the truth. And coming to my Ph.D., I learned how to do research and disseminate the results in the best conferences. Perhaps the most important experience I had is coping up with failures, maybe something that works for months and realizes it doesn’t work or can be a good paper you submit to a conference but then is rejected.

My Postdoc in KTH, in Stockholm, was mainly work in a large team. I collaborated a lot, so I was able to know what are the best practices in collaboration. I could understand what were the interests of the parties to make the collaboration successful. And also I received good tips from my supervisor there on how to manage teams.

All these experiences made me the researcher that I am today.