Reid G. Smith
Reid G. Smith completed his Stanford AI dissertation in December 1978. It introduced the Contract Net approach to coordinating tasks across a distributed problem-solving system. Smith’s Contract Net paper specifies communication and control between nodes that have tasks and nodes that can execute them. It demonstrates the protocol in distributed sensing and discusses resource allocation through negotiation. Smith served as i2k Connect chief executive from 2014 to 2025 and became executive chair in 2025. The company works on AI-assisted document search and knowledge access.
- Now at
- i2k Connect
- Works
- 68
- Citations
- 3,291
- h-index
- 18
Publication numbers from OpenAlex, as of 14 October 2026.
Timeline
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1978
Contract Net doctorate
Reid G. Smith completed his Stanford AI dissertation in December 1978. It introduced the Contract Net approach to coordinating tasks across a distributed problem-solving system.
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1980
Negotiating task allocation
Smith’s Contract Net paper specifies communication and control between nodes that have tasks and nodes that can execute them. It demonstrates the protocol in distributed sensing and discusses resource allocation through negotiation.
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2014–2025
Knowledge systems company
Smith served as i2k Connect chief executive from 2014 to 2025 and became executive chair in 2025. The company works on AI-assisted document search and knowledge access.
Sources and credits
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