Windows 10: Microsoft investing $1 billion in OpenAI to support AGI

Brink · Jul 22, 2019

Microsoft Corp. and OpenAI, two companies thinking deeply about the role of AI in the world and how to build secure, trustworthy and ethical AI to serve the public, have partnered to further extend Microsoft Azure’s capabilities in large-scale AI systems. Through this partnership, the companies will accelerate breakthroughs in AI and power OpenAI’s efforts to create artificial general intelligence (AGI). The resulting enhancements to the Azure platform will also help developers build the next generation of AI applications. The partnership covers the following:

Microsoft and OpenAI will jointly build new Azure AI supercomputing technologies

OpenAI will port its services to run on Microsoft Azure, which it will use to create new AI technologies and deliver on the promise of artificial general intelligence

Microsoft will become OpenAI’s preferred partner for commercializing new AI technologies

The companies will focus on building a computational platform in Azure of unprecedented scale, which will train and run increasingly advanced AI models, include hardware technologies that build on Microsoft’s supercomputing technology, and adhere to the two companies’ shared principles on ethics and trust. This will create the foundation for advancements in AI to be implemented in a safe, secure and trustworthy way and is a critical reason the companies chose to partner together.

Over the past decade, innovative applications of deep neural networks coupled with increasing computational power have led to continuous AI breakthroughs in areas such as vision, speech, language processing, translation, robotic control and even gaming. Modern AI systems work well for the specific problem on which they’ve been trained, but getting AI systems to help address some of the hardest problems facing the world today will require generalization and deep mastery of multiple AI technologies. OpenAI and Microsoft’s vision is for artificial general intelligence to work with people to help solve currently intractable multidisciplinary problems, including global challenges such as climate change, more personalized healthcare and education.

“The creation of AGI will be the most important technological development in human history, with the potential to shape the trajectory of humanity,” said Sam Altman, CEO, OpenAI. “Our mission is to ensure that AGI technology benefits all of humanity, and we’re working with Microsoft to build the supercomputing foundation on which we’ll build AGI. We believe it’s crucial that AGI is deployed safely and securely and that its economic benefits are widely distributed. We are excited about how deeply Microsoft shares this vision.”

“AI is one of the most transformative technologies of our time and has the potential to help solve many of our world’s most pressing challenges,” said Satya Nadella, CEO, Microsoft. “By bringing together OpenAI’s breakthrough technology with new Azure AI supercomputing technologies, our ambition is to democratize AI — while always keeping AI safety front and center — so everyone can benefit.”
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https://news.microsoft.com/2019/07/2...-technologies/

Microsoft invests in and partners with OpenAI to support us building beneficial AGI

:)

Brink · Jul 22, 2019

Microsoft will invest $5 billion in IoT

Today, we are announcing that we will invest $5 billion in the Internet of Things over the next four years. The reason we are doing this is simple: Our goal is to give every customer the ability to transform their businesses, and the world at large, with connected solutions.

It’s well understood that IoT solutions can create operational efficiencies, but we know the true impact extends well beyond that into our daily lives. Our customers are delivering electricity to schools in Africa, creating better patient outcomes with predictive care, improving worker safety on job sites and driver safety on Alaskan roadways.

We’ve been invested in IoT before the term was coined, when enterprises had these endpoints in their factories, buildings and other devices that were totally “dark.” Today, we’re planning to dedicate even more resources to research and innovation in IoT and what is ultimately evolving to be the new intelligent edge. With our IoT platform spanning cloud, OS and devices, we are uniquely positioned to simplify the IoT journey so any customer—regardless of size, technical expertise, budget, industry or other factors—can create trusted, connected solutions that improve business and customer experiences, as well as the daily lives of people all over the world. The investment we’re announcing today will ensure we continue to meet all our customers’ needs both now and in the future.

Advancing the Opportunity in IoT and Intelligent Edge

We’re now seeing the kind of increased adoption and exponential growth that analysts have been forecasting for years, and we’re just getting started. A.T. Kearney predicts IoT will lead to a $1.9 trillion productivity increase and $177 billion in reduced costs by 2020. This effect will be pervasive, from connected homes and cars to manufacturers to smart cities and utilities—and everything in between.

This increased investment will support continued innovation in our technology platform, as well as supporting programs. We will continue research and development in key areas, including securing IoT, creating development tools and intelligent services for IoT and the edge, and investments to grow our partner ecosystem. Customers and partners can expect new products and services, offerings, resources and programs.

Enabling increasingly sophisticated customers

Microsoft’s IoT offerings today include what businesses need to get started, ranging from operating systems for devices, cloud services to control and secure them, advanced analytics to gain insights, and business applications to enable intelligent action. We’ve seen great traction with customers and partners who continue to come up with new ideas and execute them on our platform.

Companies like Steelcase, Kohler, Chevron, United Technologies and Johnson Controls are all innovating with Microsoft’s IoT platform, launching new products, solutions and services that transform their business.

Johnson Controls has transformed the humble thermostat into a smart device that can monitor a range of conditions to optimize building temperatures automatically. Schneider Electric has built a solution to harness solar energy in Nigeria and using our IoT platform to do maintenance remotely on the panels, quite literally to keep the lights on. Kohler has created a new line of intelligent kitchen and bath fixtures that are not only luxurious to use, but more economical as well. The Alaska Department of Transportation is working with Colorado-based Fathym to build smart roadways that monitor weather conditions and can alert drivers and state officials about treacherous conditions.

These stories keep rolling in. With each new implementation, we’re witnessing a unique transformation. We’re also getting a look into how both customers and partners overcome the specific challenges of building an IoT solution that harnesses massive amounts of data. Whether they’re building products that transform the home, office or factory floor, one thing remains clear: IoT is a collaborative, multi-disciplinary effort that spans cloud development, machine learning, AI, security and privacy.

We are committed to helping customers bring their vision to life across every industry. Today’s announcement is big—for us and for the future of IoT and the intelligent edge. It positions us to support customers as they develop new and increasingly sophisticated IoT solutions, which few could have imagined just a few years ago. We can’t wait to see what comes from our customers and partners next, and we’ll have more to share throughout the year.
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Source: Microsoft will invest $5 billion in IoT. Here's why. - Internet of Things

punani · Jul 22, 2019

Intel Invests $1 Billion in the AI Ecosystem

Meh, what I want to see is $1 billion investment for improved NPC AI in games *Big Grin

btarunr · Jul 22, 2019

Intel Invests $1 Billion in the AI Ecosystem

The following is an opinion editorial provided by Brian Krzanich, chief executive officer of Intel Corporation. At Intel, we have an optimistic and pragmatic view of artificial intelligence's (AI) impact on society, jobs and daily life that will mimic other profound transformations - from the industrial to the PC revolutions. Our belief is that AI will bring significant new opportunities to transform business - from retail to healthcare to manufacturing - and have an immensely positive impact on society.

AI will make the impossible possible: advancing research on cancer, Parkinson's disease and brain disorders; helping to find missing children; and furthering scientific efforts in climate change, space exploration and oceanic research. To drive AI innovation, Intel is making strategic investments spanning technology, R&D and partnerships with business, government, academia and community groups. We are deeply committed to unlocking the promise of AI: conducting research on neuromorphic computing, exploring new architectures and learning paradigms. We have also invested in startups like Mighty AI, Data Robot and Lumiata through our Intel Capital portfolio and have invested more than $1 billion in companies that are helping to advance artificial intelligence.

I believe Intel will be the AI platform of choice, offering unmatched reliability, performance, security and integration. We are 100 percent committed to creating the roadmap of optimized products to support emerging mainstream AI workloads.

AI solutions require a wide range of power and performance to meet application needs, and Intel has the largest selection of options for our customers to choose from. To support the sheer breadth of future AI workloads, businesses will need unmatched flexibility and infrastructure optimization so that both highly specialized and general purpose AI functions can run alongside other critical business workloads. The Intel Nervana AI portfolio delivers this breadth:

Intel Xeon Scalable family - providing highly scalable processors for evolving AI workloads and our purpose-built silicon for the most intensive deep learning training, code-named "Lake Crest"

Intel Mobileye - vision technologies for specialized use cases such as active safety and autonomous driving

Intel FPGAs - programmable accelerators for deep learning inference

Intel Movidius - low-power vision technology provides machine learning at the edge

AI is still in its infancy, and as this space evolves, we'll continue to advance disruptive approaches in compute that support the complex workloads of today and tomorrow.

Windows 10: Microsoft investing $1 billion in OpenAI to support AGI

Microsoft investing $1 billion in OpenAI to support AGI

Microsoft investing $1 billion in OpenAI to support AGI

Microsoft investing $1 billion in OpenAI to support AGI

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