Baidu’s Apollo Seeks to Democratize US Autonomous Driving
Synced recently attended a Baidu meet-up at the company’s newly-opened Silicon Valley offices, where details were released on the latest iteration of the Apollo platform, Apollo 1.5.
Category: Industry
Global AI Industry updates.
Delphi Acquires MIT Spin-off nuTonomy for US$450 Million
Delphi Automotive (Delphi), one of the world’s largest automotive parts manufacturers, has announced the acquisition of MIT spin-off self-driving car company nuTonomy for US$450 million.
Money is Chasing Chinese AI Startups
Beijing-based Horizon Robotics’ A-plus series funding round is expected to raise US$100 million by year’s end.
AI Phone Duel: $825 Mate 10 vs $999 iPhone X
This Monday in Munich, China’s largest domestic mobile phone maker Huawei unveiled Mate 10 — billed as the most powerful AI phone in the world.
AI Biweekly: 10 Bits from Oct (Pt 1)
Instagram Releases Shoppable Tags Feature in US; Voyage Launches Self-Driving Taxis in San Jose Escorting 4,000 Residents; Deutsche Bank Announces First Artificial Intelligence Implementation Through IBM Watson
Under the Hood of a Self-Driving Taxi, a Look at Computation and Other Core Self-Driving Car Systems
The objective of Voyage’s self-driving vehicles is to deliver fully functional autonomous taxis within five years.
Shi is Key to Ma’s NASA
Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba announced on September 11 that the respected University of Michigan professor will lead fundamental research on quantum technology at its Seattle lab.
Alibaba Pumps US$15 Billion into Quantum Computing & AI
Alibaba Group announced its new DAMO (Dharma) Academy for fundamental and disruptive technology research.
Petuum Closes $93 Million in Series B Funding Led by SoftBank
PITTSBURGH, PA – October 10, 2017 – Petuum, Inc., a machine learning (ML) infrastructure platform, has closed $93 million in Series B fundingContinue Reading
Six Disruptive AI Platforms for Law
An intelligent revolution of the legal industry has begun.
Good AI Lab Energizes Biotech With AI
Silicon Valley-based Good AI lab aims to crowdsource the world’s unused FLOPS in order to provide medical researchers with the computing power they need.
AI Biweekly: 10 Bits from Sept (Pt 2)
GE using AI to optimize power grids, Intel pumps US$1 billion into AI startups IBM targets India’s 2.7 billion connected devices for IoT market, NVIDIA GTC China announces partnerships with Alibaba and Huawei for smart cities.
NVIDIA GTC China: TensorRT 3.0, AI Machine Processor Xavier, and China Partnerships
The annual NVIDIA GTA Conference opened in Beijing on September 26th.
Shenzhen Based RoboSense is the Next DJI for LIDAR
The global market for this versatile, high-precision, long-distance measuring “eye” will reach US$36 billion in 2030.
Baidu All in AI: DuerOS and Apollo Open Platforms
The “Baidu AI Developers Conference” (Baidu Create 2017) was held July 5 at the China National Convention Center in Beijing.Continue Reading
Best Time Ever for AI Startups?
While tech giants like Google and Amazon are setting the pace in AI R&D these days, startups can also find success by targeting niche markets
What AI Talent Are Companies Hungry For?
As more companies bet on AI, computer scientists with AI expertise are coming into demand on the job market.
AI Biweekly: 10 Bits from Sept (Pt 1)
09/05 — Google Updates Its Street View Cameras with AI and Machine Learning Google just upgraded its street view camera for the firstContinue Reading
Apple Embraces AI with iPhone X
The latest iPhone struts its AI strength with three new features: Face ID, for facial recognition; Animoji, an emoji animator; and a new camera exposure mode called portrait lighting.
NASA is Using Intel’s Deep Learning to Find Better Landing Sites on the Moon
Recently NASA announced that their Frontier Development Laboratory (FDL) would cooperate with Intel to apply deep learning for space exploration.
Pittsburgh’s Pivot to Artificial Intelligence
Synced meets the people transforming a former steel town into a metropolis powered by artificial intelligence and robotics.
AI Biweekly: 10 Bits from August (Pt 2)
Google, Apple, Walmart, Intel, Baidu, Alibaba, Siemens, Salesforce, IBM: August digest from industry giants
From Amazon to Alibaba: The Quest of Computer Vision Scientist Xiaofeng Ren
“I am tempted by Alibaba’s large pool of business scenarios and huge user base,” says Xiaofeng Ren.
Huawei Announces Kirin 970: AI In Your Phone
China’s biggest domestic mobile phone maker, Huawei, is now powering its phones with artificial intelligence (AI) engines. The Chinese techContinue Reading
GoodAI – Sending AI to School
Marek Rosa’s dream is to create a machine that improves itself recursively to achieve an intelligence level humans cannot imagine, allowing it to tackle problems of any scale.
A $30 AR Headset?
Amber Garage’s HoloKit is quickly positioning itself as a market stimulator. Just as Google Cardboard increased access and interest in virtual reality, so might HoloKit for augmented reality.
CVPR 2017: The Fusion of Deep Learning and Computer Vision, What’s Next?
CVPR 2017 conference covered topics in: Machine Learning, Object Recognition & Scene Understanding – Computer Vision & Language, 3D Vision, Human Analyzing, Low- & Mid- Level Vision, Image Motion & Tracking: Video Analysis, Computational Photography, Applications.
Chinese Computer Vision Startup Turns Heads With ‘SensePose’
In contrast to traditional approaches that use infrared or structured light along with the aforementioned hardware, SensePose needs only ambient light and a regular RGB camera lens.
One Night at CVPR 2017 : Exploring IJCV and the Asia Research Force
Hosted annually in the United States, the Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition Conference received 2,620 submissions, accepted 783 papers, attracted 127 sponsors with $859,000 in sponsorship and close to 5,000 attendees.
Canvassing Switzerland’s AI Landscape
We explore top-notch Swiss AI facilities: starting with deep learning and neural network research at IDSIA in Lugano, to interdisciplinary research at École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne and University of Basel, and ending with robotics innovations at ETH in Zurich and University of Zurich.
Amazon is Building its Grocery Empire
Most categories have been taken over by e-commerce yet the category of fresh groceries hasn’t been disrupted by online.
Apple is in a Dilemma on iPhone’s 10-year-old Birthday
Apple is confused about what its next big thing will be.
Giving Robots a Sense of Touch
The rubber on GelSight sensor will conform to any object pressed against it, resulting in the reflective lights on the metallic paint to vary according to different materials and shapes.
Building AI Superclusters in Canada
Canada is determined to build AI superclusters in Toronto-Waterloo, Montréal, and Edmonton.
Deep Learning Paper Sparks Online Feud!
A tweet from Google DeepMind’s Nenad Tomasev, concerning a paper from the prestigious Montreal Institute for Learning Algorithms has sparked a well-known natural language processing expert Yoav Goldberg to tweet back: “…I really dislike this work.”
Ready, Set, Go! Meet Yuandong Tian: AI Maverick
“Scientists need passion to do research, and that is my passion.” – Yuandong Tian, Facebook Artificial Intelligence Researcher
Epic’s Tim Sweeney: Deep Learning A.I. Will Open New Frontiers in Game Design
Tim Sweeney predicts that video game companies will ultimately utilize advanced AI techniques when the VR/AR games (or so-called “The Metaverse” games) become popular, due to advancements of cameras and displays
Customer Success with Machine Learning (Google Cloud NEXT’17)
The reason why TensorFlow is so widely used is due to its automatic derivation of functions and distributed computing capability. This increase in interest can also be found in commercial applications.
Cool IJCNN Stuff from Alaska
From May 14 to 18, the 30th International Joint Conference on Neural Networks (IJCNN 2017) was held in Anchorage, AK, USA. Continuing the long tradition, the conference is organized by the International Neural Network Society (INNS), in cooperation with the IEEE Computational Intelligence Society (IEEE-CIS).
Google I/O 2017: Integrating Everything with AI
At the 10th Google I/O, held May 17-19 at the Shoreline Amphitheatre in Mountain View, California, Google took a different approach from unveiling exciting new products, by putting its focus on the convergence of existing products, aimed at providing a better user experience.