Quriosity
Monthly Newsletter of Team Quantinuum
December 2017 |Volume 8, Issue 10
How Big Data is changing the Gambling
The Turing Test 1
Quriosity 10 | December 2017
CONTENTS Curabitur varius lobortis lectus, comments to: quis pharetra eros newsletter.quantinuum@gmail.com dictum sit amet non volutpat Editorial Team: Rupal Doshi
Please submit your articles & your
Amod Kulkarni Aditya Gupta Chaitanya Agarwal VVNS Anudeep Kapil Gupta Samoshri Mitra Parvinder Singh Khushbu Mehta
COVER STORY-
DATA ANAYTICS IN CASINO INDUSTRY
SUB ARTICLE-
BETA DISTRIBUTION
QUANT GURU-
SAMARENDRA NATH ROY
CURIOSITY UPDATE NEWS DIGEST QUANT FUN QUANT CONNECT
Designing Team: Shreyas Kulkarni Ashish Mahadik
www.quantinuumsimsr.com
1
Quriosity 10 | December 2017
EDITOR’S NOTE
Welcome to the latest issue of Quriosity, the monthly newsletter of Quantinuum! Many current data analysis techniques are beyond the reach of most people. Obscure maths and daunting algorithms have created a chasm for problem solvers and decision makers. Quriosity is trying to bridge these gaps by giving appropriate inputs to our students and readers who are the future managers. The objective of Quriosity is to publish up-to-date articles on data analytics, alongside relevant and insightful news. This way the magazine aspires to be vibrant, engaging and accessible, and at the same time integrative. The cover story by Khushbu Mehta is based on how the Big data analytics is changing the casino industry. The on article Beta Distribution by Niki Gandhi explains what beta distribution is, how it functions and what are the practicle uses of it in real world. We have an article on Quant Guru “Samarendra Nath Roy”, highlighting the contribution of the Indian mathematician & statistician in multivariate statistical analysis. Any articles that you wish to submit, either individually or collaboratively, are much appreciated and will make a substantial contribution to the development and success of the magazine.
Thank you and Happy Reading! Editorial Team Quantinuum@SIMSR
2
www.quantinuumsimsr.com
Quriosity 10 | December “A dollar won is twice as sweet as a dollar earned,” said Paul Newman in The Colour of Money. But with growing competition for the entertainment dollar, winning over customers has never been more challenging.” Casinos are being run like financial services firms and analytics professionals are moving from banking to the gaming industry. That makes some sense, since companies in both industries need to balance financial risks and returns in making decisions and placing their business bets. Hence casino companies are highly relying on analytical technologies. Analytics were applied to general business issues mainly in marketing but recent development said it could be applied on the gaming floor. Running a casino presents a big stats problem and a correspondingly large opportunity. Casino managers know the probability of gamblers winning different games, but laying out the floor to optimize the amount of money that can be taken in is not a sure bet. All those games generate plenty of data, though. That combination makes the casino industry a prime candidate for analytical technologies and applications. Rom Hendler, chief administrative officer at Las Vegas Sands Corp., owns nine casinos and resort facilities firmly believes in the idea that data analytics gives casino operators an edge . “Analytics technology is essential to be competitive,” he said in an interview at SAS Institute Inc.’s 2014 Premier Business Leadership Series conference in Las Vegas. When deciding which games to offer or replace, casinos may look at historic results and reason that games which were popular in the past will continue to be so in the future. Therein lies a missed opportunity. With lot invaluable customer data available, a growing number of casinos around the world are turning to advanced analytics to assist with slot floor planning. Making sense of the data is important. SAS-based analytical technologies help to predict the impact of moving games from one area of a casino floor to another. To start, they collect data on how much money
3
CAPTION: sumquunt adi aut aut atis quiscia pro inimos que di dus conecuptas as maximo que n quiscia
ANALYTICS IN CASINO INDUSTRY -By Khushbu Mehta each game, whether table games or slots, currently brings in. They also collect information on how people move about the casino. When the gathered data is combined with the odds of a particular game paying out, the analytics team can model what its performance would look like in different locations to help determine where the game should be placed in order to achieve the optimal performance level. The process of positioning games brings into a broader data-driven approach to optimizing revenues. For example, Hendler said a good way to encourage gambling is to give customers free nights or discounted dinners in the hotel that houses a casino. But the casino would lose money if it did so for everyone, because some people don’t gamble much. To help highlight such offers, Sands runs customer analytics applications on data it has collected showing how often individuals gamble, how much money they tend to spend in the casino and what kinds of games they like. The first step in the process was assessing and cleaning the available
data to enable a detailed categorization of relevant information to gain insights into slot performance to date. The data needed to be reviewed and revised for consistency to allow the history of similar games to be tracked. This was a key challenge of the initiative because results of analysis can only be as good as the information that gets analysed. Next, the team used this information to provide a best-case predictive forecast into how each game would perform in the year to come. In the process, it became possible to begin collecting insight into leading predictors of guest preference that would optimize profitability while supporting the integrity of fair and random play. Leveraging categorization and each game vendor’s market research, it became possible to isolate a surrogate to help it analyse options for new game purchases. Moving forward, the technology will allow the industry to predict the potential impact of changes on slot performance based ‘what if ’ scenarios. This provides much greater forecasting power than the traditional approach to decision making, which was www.quantinuumsimsr.com
Quriosity 10 | December 2017 limited to reports based on one variable, looking exclusively at historical data. Finally, advanced optimization was utilized to determine the best approach to future business, considering factors such as physical space and budget. This information will help them optimize its slot purchase options, including the analysis of which machines to replace and when to replace them, while also ensuring player experience is not hampered through down-time. In the end, the solutions offered by the test case promise a new perspective. This solution has helped to immediately improve the understanding of customer preferences. As the databases become richer with new game and machine attributes, they’ll also have stronger predictors of long-term performance, allowing us to make better decisions in the future. References: http://searchbusinessanalytics. techtarget.com/feature/Analyticaltechnologies-are-game-changer-forcasino-company http://www.avianaglobal.com/blog/ casinos-bet-large-with-big-data/ https://www.sas.com/en_ca/insights/ articles/analytics/analytics-moderncasino.html
CAPTION: sumquunt adi aut aut atis quiscia pro inimos que di dus conecuptas as maximo que n quiscia
Beta Distribution -By Niki Gandhi The Beta distribution is defined as a probability distribution which is continuous. It has two positive shape parameters denoted by α and β, that appear as exponents of the random variable and control the shape of the distribution. A family of probabilities is represented by this distribution and is a versatile way to represent outcomes for percentages or proportions. For example, how likely is it that BJP will win Gujarat 2017 elections? You might think the probability is 0.2. Your friend might think it’s 0.15. The beta distribution gives us a way to describe this. The word “beta” has 3 completely different meanings. 1. Beta (α, β) where “Beta” is the name of the probability distribution. 2. B (α, β) where “Beta” is the name of a function that appears in the denominator of the density function. 3. β - Here, “Beta” is the name of the second parameter in the density function. Characterization of Beta Distribution: Definition: Let a variable X be an absolutely continuous random variable and its support be the unit interval: Rx = [0,1] Let α,β be a subset of R. We can say that
4
variable X has a Beta distribution with the shape parameters α and β if its probability density function is
where B() is the Beta function. Beta random variable is a random variable having a Beta distribution. Probability Density Function The probability density function of the beta distribution is represented as a power function of the variable x and of its reflection (1 − x), for 0 ≤ x ≤ 1, and shape parameters α, β > 0. Properties of Beta Distribution Measures of central tendency of a Beta distribution are 1. Mode of Beta Distribution: The mode of a Beta distributed random variable X with α, β > 1 is the most likely value of the distribution. Anti-mode is the lowest point of the probability density curve, when both parameters are less than one (α, β < 1). 2. Median of Beta Distribution: The median of the beta distribution is the unique real number. 3. Mean of Beta Distribution: The expected value (mean) of a Beta distribution of random variable X with www.quantinuumsimsr.com
Quriosity| November 2017
Quriosity 10 | December 2017 two parameters α and β is a function of only the ratio β/α of these parameters. About the Beta function B: The total area under the density curve equals 1 which is assured by the Beta function B in the denominator also known as the “normalizing constant”. The Beta function is equal to a ratio of Gamma functions: B(α, β) = Γ(α)*Γ(β)/ Γ(α+β)
used computing facilities at the newly established Indian Statistical Institute (founded by Professor P. C. Mahalanobis). Roy worked with scholars like J. M. Sengupta, H. C. Sinha, Raj Chandra Bose, K. R. Nair, K. Kishen and C. R. Rao, to create an active group of statisticians under Mahalanobis. He is known for his ground-breaking contribution to multivariate statistical analysis primarily that of the Jacobians of complicated transformations for various exacts distributions, rectangular coordinates and the Bartlett decomposition. His thesis included the Post master’s work at the Indian Statistical Institute where he worked under Mahalanobis. Roy went to the United States to take up a Visiting Professorship of Statistics at
The expected value of a variable that is Beta distributed is: E(x) = µ = α / α+β and the variance is given by Variance(x) = [ β / (α+β) (α+β + 1) ] * µ Use of Beta Distribution: It is used to model one’s uncertainty about the probability of success of an experiment. Advantages of Beta Distribution: • Better Project Management through Beta Distribution • Better estimate of the time required to complete projects can be made by combining the beta distribution or three-point estimation technique with basic statistics. References: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beta_ distribution https://www.statlect.com/probabilitydistributions/beta-distribution http://pj.freefaculty.org/guides/stat/ Distributions/DistributionWriteups/ Beta/Beta.pdf http://www.statisticshowto.com/betadistribution/
5
Quant Guru:
Samarendra Nath Roy
- Dropad Saxena Samarendra Nath Roy (11 December 1906 – 23 July 1964) was an Indianborn American mathematician and statistician. Early Life: Roy was the son of Kali Nath Roy and Suniti Bala Roy. His father, Kali Nath Roy was a freedom fighter and the Chief Editor of the newspaper The Tribune. During the Jallianwala Bagh massacre (April 1919), The Tribune published a news report named “Prayer at the Jama Masjid”, on 6 April 1919. The report described about the barbaric acts done by the British. As a result, the British administration got furious and arrested Kali Nath Roy and sentenced him to rigorous imprisonment for two years and fined him one thousand rupees. Academic Career: He obtained first class in both the BSc Mathematics (Honours) from Presidency College of the University of Calcutta in 1928 and the MSc in Applied Mathematics (with the Theory of Relativity as the elective) from the University of Calcutta in 1931. Roy joined the Department of Applied Mathematics at the University of Calcutta as a research associate. There he
Columbia University in New York in 1949. Roy later joined Bose at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in the spring of 1950. Then Roy returned to India and became Head of the Department of Statistics at the University of Calcutta during the academic year 1949–50. At the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Roy joined Bose as a Professor of Statistics in the Statistics Department. S. N. Roy was mentored 15 doctorate students of the Statistics Department from 1950 till 1963. To honour his Birth anniversary an International Conference on “Multivariate Statistical Methods in the 21st Century: The Legacy of Professor S.N. Roy” was held at Kolkata, India in December 2006. The Journal of Statistical Planning and Inference published a special Issue for celebrating the Centennial of Birth of S. N. Roy. References: http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews. ac.uk/Biographies/Roy.html https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ Samarendra_Nath_Roy ht t p s : / / w i k i v i s u a l l y. co m / w i k i / Samarendra_Nath_Roy www.quantinuumsimsr.com
Quriosity 10 | December 2017
Curiosity Update
RARE RELIC FROM EARLY UNIVERSE DISCOVERED
An unusual huge black hole has been spotted by NASA’s Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) which is 13 billion light years away, making it the furthest object of its type to have yet been found. What makes it so unusual is that it managed to grow so large a mere 690 million years after the big bang. Astronomers think that there must have been special conditions for such an object to grow so large, but there is currently only speculation as to how it managed to do this. This black hole is a quasar. Quasars are very active, luminous young galaxies containing supermassive black holes surrounded by a disc of gas. This particular quasar is so fascinating because it comes from a point in time so close to the beginning of the Universe. Now for a very quick lesson on the history of the Universe courtesy of NASA as I can’t put this into better words: “The universe began in a hot soup of particles that rapidly spread apart in a period called inflation. About 400,000 years after the Big Bang, these particles cooled and coalesced into neutral hydrogen gas. But the universe stayed dark, without any luminous sources, until gravity condensed matter into the first stars and galaxies. The energy released by these ancient galaxies caused the neutral hydrogen to get excited and ionize, or lose an electron. The gas has remained in that state since that time. Once the universe became re-ionized d, photons could travel freely throughout space. This is the point at which the universe became transparent to light. Much of the hydrogen surrounding the newly discovered quasar is neutral. That means the quasar is not only the most distant — it is also the only example we have that can be seen before the universe became re-ionized.” “It was the universe’s last major transition and one of the current frontiers of astrophysics,” Bañados said. It’s hoped that by studying this distant object that we can gain valuable information about the young Universe.
6
www.quantinuumsimsr.com
Quriosity 10 | December 2017
News Digest NASA Explores AI-Driven Cognitive Radios for Space Communications NASA spacecraft’s, which typically rely on human-controlled radio systems to communicate with Earth, are now looking at cognitive radios - the infusion of artificial intelligence into space communications networks to meet demand and increase efficiency. Specific portions of the electromagnetic spectrum used for communications to various users. However, such channels are limited in number and can cause a bottleneck in the era of increasing communications. Additionally, cognitive radio may make communications network operations more efficient by decreasing the need for human intervention.
Introducing Titan V by NVIDIA, That Delivers Highly Efficient Deep Learning Computing
The US Headquartered NVIDIA, which is considered a world leader in visual computing technologies introduced TITAN V, which the company claims to be the most powerful GPU for the PC, driven by the world’s most advanced GPU architecture, NVIDIA Volta. Particularly useful for developers who want to use their PCs for work around AI, deep learning and high performance computing, TITAN V’s Volta architecture, doubles the energy efficiency of the previous generation Pascal design, enabling dramatic boosts in performance in the same power envelope. It is available at $2,999 from the NVIDIA store across the participating countries.
LinkedIn Report Shows Jobs in Machine Learning, Data Science & Big Data Saw Spectacular Growth in the Last 5 Years
In a news that will warm the hearts of all people associated with the Data Analytics, the latest LinkedIn survey of 2017 has proven that machine learning engineer, data scientist, and big data engineers have ranked among the top emerging jobs this year. According to the LinkedIn survey, the fastest growing job over the last five years is machine learning engineer, as the number of open positions on LinkedIn has multiplied by nearly over 10 times. The profile of a data scientist came in second, with the number of jobs growing 6.5 times since 2012.
Google’s AlphaZero Masters All Chess Knowledge Known to Mankind In Just 24 Hours
After creating a “perfect” recipe for gluten-free chocolate chip cookie, Google’s Artificial Intelligence program has now mastered the game of chess. According to a new paper, Google researchers recently detailed as to how their latest AI creation, AlphaZero, developed a “superhuman performance” in chess. Reportedly, the program only took four hours to learn the rules before obliterating the world champion chess program, Stockfish.. Chess researcher David Kramaley, who is also the CEO of chess science website Chessble, said, “We now know who our new overlord is… It will no doubt revolutionize the game, but think about how this could be applied outside chess. This algorithm could run cities, continents, universes.”
US-Based Planet Labs Inc. To Set Up Development Centre In India
A US-based integrated aerospace and Data Analytics company Planet Labs Inc is set to open a development centre in India. Reportedly, one of their key motivators was to tap into the technical expertise as well as explore the business opportunities. Google Uses AI to Find Recipe for the Perfect Gluten-Free Chocolate Chip Cookie Amidst doomsday theories about Artificial Intelligence, a delicious exception is making critics think twice about the effects of AI and Machine Learning on human lives. This week, a baker from Pittsburgh, US, overcame one of the major hurdles in baking — creating a delicious gluten free cookie. As most bakers (and foodies) know, cooking, especially baking without any gluten content can be difficult, and often, unsatisfying. Using a technique called the Bayesian Optimization, the team set a bunch of parameters or ingredients in the cookie recipe, such as, the type of chocolate, quantity of sugar, flour and vanilla, among others.
IBM’s New AI Can Predict Outcomes of Chemical Reactions Which May Soon Help in Drug Discovery In a recent development by IBM, they have come up with a high profile public demonstration of AI where they have used machine learning technology in the complex subject of organic chemistry. The AI chemist can predict chemical reactions in a way that could prove to be incredibly important for areas like drug discovery. According to a recent paper published by the company, it is using highly detailed data set on thousands and millions of different reactions taken from various research paper published over the years.
Google’s Artificial Intelligence Successfully Spawns an AI ‘Child’ That Easily Outperforms ManMade AI
Many may look at the end of 2017 as a defining moment in human history as the year when an Artificially Intelligent system created its own “child” — another AI capable of a specific task. A few weeks ago, Google’s AutoML — an artificial intelligence program created to build artificial intelligence programs — spawned a “child” using its reinforcement learning technique. This works like Machine Learning, except it is entirely automated where AutoML (the “parent”) acts as the neural network for its task-driven AI child. Named NASNet, the AI child then was tasked to recognize objects which included people, cars, traffic lights, handbags, backpacks, among others, in a video in real-time.
7
www.quantinuumsimsr.com
Quriosity 10 | December 2017
Quant Fun Find out the missing numbers in the following images.
8
www.quantinuumsimsr.com
Quriosity 10 | December 2017
Quant Connect
Quantinuum, the Quant and Analysis committee of KJ Somaiya Institute of Management & Research aims to empower students and professionals alike to organise and understand numbers and in turn, to make good and rational decisions as future managers. the newsletter publish monthly consists of a gamut of articles for readers ranging from beginners to advanced learners so as to further enrich the young minds understand the contributions made to the field of mathematics along with a couple of brain-racking sessions of puzzles to tickle the gray cells. for any further queries and feedback, please contact the following address: KJ Somaiya Institute of Management Studies and Research, Vidya Vihar, Ghatkopar East, Mumbai- 400077 or drop us a mail at newsletter.quantinuum @gmail.com
Mentor: Email:
Prof. N. S. Nilakantan (+919820680741) nilakantan@somaiya.edu
Team Leaders: Vaibhav M (+917708521382) Maheshwaran Kumar (+919566173411) Rishita Shah (+919867290018)
9
www.quantinuumsimsr.com