Anch.AI Launches Ethical Artificial Intelligence Governance Platform

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March 24, 2022

Anch.AI Ethical Artificial Intelligence Governance Platform

A leading expert on the effects of digitalization on organizations, Anch.AI announces the launch of its new ethical artificial intelligence governance platform.

The newly launched platform will act as a one-stop-shop for businesses looking for ethical AI governance. According to the company, its AI governance platform offers multiple services such as screening, assessment, auditing, mitigation, reporting tools, and others.

The features enable companies and their technology, legal, and business teams to manage compliance and risk exposures on any artificial intelligence solutions in their environment.

It is a highly capable solution that allows organizations to quickly and efficiently adapt responsible AI solutions and gain control over their ethical AI risks.

Göran Sundin, an AI strategist at Swedish Tax Agency, said, “Anch.AI is a trusted partner of three years, supporting us to achieve ethical AI through transparency and alignment across our organization.”

Anch.AI’s novel platform uses the following methods to provide recommendations for businesses helping them in avoiding costly and damaging risks –

Screening specific AI solutions for ethical pitfalls.
Evaluating the ethical vulnerabilities to which the AI solution or the organization is exposed.
Using risk-mitigation tools based on specific risk exposure.
Continuously auditing ethical AI performance.
Reporting on ethical AI performance

Sweden-based artificial intelligence company Anch.AI was founded by Anna Fellander in 2018. The firm specializes in assessing the effects of digitalization on organizations, society, and the economy to determine the ethical and societal risks of artificial intelligence. To date, Anch.AI has raised more than $2 million from investors like Benhamou Global Ventures, Terrain Invest, and many others over one funding round.

Founder of Anch.AI, Anna Fellander, said, “Ethical AI is not just about mitigating legal and reputational risk, it’s the right thing to do to gain trust among stakeholders and clients. Beyond compliance measures, organizations need to be accountable for their use of AI.”

She further added that their platform provides companies with the tools they need for cross-team collaboration allowing them to visualize all ethical considerations and trade-offs, enabling them to stay true to human values along with their organizational values.

NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover traverse Martian delta using AI

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Dipayan Mitra

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March 23, 2022

NASA’s Mars rover named Perseverance is all set to traverse quickly into the Martian delta using artificial intelligence (AI).

The rover will cover a significant distance in a single month, which has never been achieved before to date.

According to mission officials, the six-wheeled rover is now on a 5-kilometer filled with sandpits, craters, and fields of sharp rocks. The mission began on March 14th, 2022, and will take the Perseverance rover to an ancient river delta on Mars.

The intriguing fact about the 40-meter high ancient river delta within Jezero Crater is that it had a lake that existed billions of years ago and has indications of prior microscopic life.

Perseverance will use its self-driving AutoNav technology, which can “think while driving,” allowing it to take and process photographs while driving.

Perseverance’s venture scientist, Ken Farley of Caltech, said, “The delta is so necessary that we’ve truly determined to minimize science actions and give attention to driving to get there extra rapidly.”

He further added that they would be capturing a lot of images of the delta throughout the trip. The closer they get, the more amazing those images may become. Scientists will then study the captured images in detail using the high-tech instruments present in the Mars rover.

Scientists have integrated Perseverance with an extra computer dedicated solely to image processing. The component uses a field-programmable gate array, which is a single-purpose, super-efficient microprocessor that is ideal for computer vision processing.

“When we first looked at Jezero Crater as a landing site, we were concerned about the dense fields of rocks we saw scattered across the crater floor,” said veteran rover planner and flight software developer of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Mark Maimone.

NVIDIA Announces World’s Most Advanced Enterprise AI Infrastructure, DGX H100 System

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Dipayan Mitra

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March 23, 2022

Tech giant NVIDIA announces the launch of its new DGX H100 System, which it claims to be the world’s most advanced enterprise AI infrastructure.

NVIDIA made this announcement during its ongoing Spring 2022 GPU Technology Conference (GTC). The newly launched system is powered by NVIDIA H100 Tensor nCore GPUs.

DGX H100 systems offer the scale required to handle the vast computing requirements of large language models, recommender systems, healthcare research, and climate science.

Each DGX H100 contains eight NVIDIA H100 GPUs connected as one by NVIDIA NVLink, delivering 32 petaflops of artificial intelligence performance at new FP8 precision, which is 6x faster than the previous generation.

The company says that the next-generation NVIDIA DGX POD and NVIDIA DGX SuperPOD AI infrastructure platforms will be built on DGX H100 systems.

Moreover, the new NVIDIA NVLink Switch System in the DGX SuperPOD architecture can connect up to 32 nodes with 256 H100 GPUs.

NVIDIA also announced Eos, a new, powerful supercomputer to demonstrate these advancements. According to the company, Eos is intended to be the world’s fastest AI system, with 576 DGX H100 computers and 4,608 DGX H100 GPUs.

The supercomputer is expected to begin its operations from the latter half of this year and will be deployed in the United States. Eos will replace its predecessor Selene, which debuted in seventh place on the Top500 in June 2020.

Founder and CEO of NVIDIA, Jensen Huang, said, “AI has fundamentally changed what software can do and how it is produced. Companies revolutionizing their industries with AI realize the importance of their AI infrastructure.”

He further added that their new DGX H100 systems would power enterprise AI factories, allowing data to be refined into their most valuable resource – intelligence.

NVIDIA says its newly announced technologies will be available globally from the third quarter of 2022. Additionally, customers can also use NVIDIA DGX-Ready Data Center partners such as Cyxtera, Digital Realty, and Equinix IBX data centers to deploy DGX systems.

NVIDIA reveals Isaac Nova Orin to Accelerate Development of Autonomous Mobile Robots

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Dipayan Mitra

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March 23, 2022

NVIDIA Isaac Nova Orin Autonomous Mobile Robots

Technology giant NVIDIA announces the launch of its new Jetson AGX Orin developer kit and Isaac Nova Orin architecture to accelerate the development of autonomous mobile robots.

The announcement was recently made during NVIDIA’s Spring 2022 GPU Technology Conference (GTC).

According to NVIDIA, Isaac Nova Orin is a cutting-edge compute and sensor reference platform to help accelerate the creation of autonomous mobile robots (AMRs), which is built on NVIDIA Jetson AGX Orin edge AI system that features state-of-an-art sensor technology along with high-performance artificial intelligence processing capability.

Jetson AGX Orin units offer up to 550 TOPS of AI computing for perception, navigation, and human-machine interaction. The modules process data gathered from the AMR’s central nervous system in real-time — essentially the sensor suite, which includes up to six cameras, three lidars, and eight ultrasonic sensors.

NVIDIA is also releasing additional software and simulation tools to help AMR deployments move faster, including hardware-accelerated modules, or Isaac ROS GEMs, which are critical for allowing robots to navigate visually.

As the eCommerce industry is flourishing worldwide, the need for better automation at warehouses is ever increasing. Intralogistics for AMRs is a big deal, with a market anticipated to hit $46 billion by 2030, up from about $8 billion in 2021.

NVIDIA’s new offering will considerably help developers make AMRs smarter and meet the global demand.

Founder and CEO of NVIDIA, Jensen Huang, said, “Modern fulfillment centers are evolving into technical marvels — facilities operated by humans and robots working together.” He further added that new processors, software, and simulation capabilities would usher in the next phase of AI, including robots that can detect, plan, and act.

The NVIDIA Isaac Sim April release includes new simulation tools that can assist save time when creating virtual settings to test and train AMRs. It drastically helps developers build complicated warehouse scenarios and configurations using 3D building blocks, allowing them to verify the robot’s performance on various logistical tasks.

IIT Madras partners with TCS to launch M.Tech in Industrial AI

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Dipayan Mitra

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March 23, 2022

The Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Madras announces its partnership with Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) to launch its new online M.Tech course in industrial artificial intelligence (AI).

According to officials, the program aims to upskill corporate employees in artificial intelligence applications to industrial problems. IIT Madras will provide the 18-month program, developed in collaboration with TCS, in a completely online live teaching method via virtual classrooms.

The first batch of the online M.Tech program will accept intakes from TCS working professionals.

Officials say that the newly announced M.Tech program will help upscale capabilities across the Indian workforce, expand the knowledge ecosystem in artificial intelligence/machine learning, and many more.

The course will consist of 28-30 hours of online classes per week, with additional activities outside of the classroom. In addition to project work, each subject in the program will include an online midterm and final test.

Director of IIT Madras, Professor V Kamakoti, said, “This program, designed in consultation with TCS, will have strong theoretical courses and labs covering important topics in data science and AI.”

He further added that fundamental mathematical approaches essential for comprehending data science algorithms, time series analysis, multivariate data analysis, machine learning, deep learning, and reinforcement learning would be covered in theoretical courses.

In a case study approach, applied courses will describe implementations of artificial intelligence solutions for industrial problems. When taken collectively, these courses will provide learners with a solid theoretical basis along with a considerable application perspective.

“There is a strong need for well-trained human resources in the area of AI. This program aims to meet this need in a manner that directly addresses Industry requirements,” said Prof. Prathap Haridoss, Dean (Academic Courses), IIT Madras.

Kore.ai opens Global R&D center in Hyderabad

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Dipayan Mitra

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March 23, 2022

Conversational AI product developing firm Kore.ai opens its new global research and development (R&D) center in Hyderabad, India.

The new facility, which was opened by CEO and founder Raj Koneru, will serve as a hub for the company’s global R&D projects in the field of conversational AI, along with product development, engineering, customer support, consultancy, and many other services.

Currently, the R&D facility has a capacity of 500 seats, but the company announces its plans to double the seating capacity to 1100 by the end of 2023.

Raj Koneru said, “Today, close to 200 customers across the world rely on the platform technology and solutions we have built, a major part here in Hyderabad, to power their customer engagement and enterprise collaboration through AI-enabled automation and experience optimization.”

He further added that India would remain key to the company’s worldwide strategy, with Hyderabad serving as a regional base for its activities. Kore.ai’s headcount in Hyderabad has expanded from roughly 240 before the pandemic to 450, according to Senior Vice-President Abhijit Mhetre.

Mhetre said that they plan to add 200-300 people by the end of this calendar year, and the company’s headcount is expected to grow to more than 650.

Last year in November, Kore.ai also partnered with technology giant NVIDIA to develop new and innovative artificial intelligence-powered conversational solutions for enterprises operating in multiple sectors globally. NVIDIA had invested in Kore.ai’s Series C funding round that raised the company’s financing to over $73 million.

United States-based conversational AI and digital products developing firm Kore.ai was founded by Raj Koneru in 2013. The company specializes in creating conversational virtual assistants driven by artificial intelligence for various industries, including banking, IT assistance, insurance, HR, and many more.

Apart from NVIDIA, Kore.ai has received funding from many investors, including Sterling National Bank, PNC, and Vistara Growth.

Russia Bans Facebook and Instagram for ‘Extremist Activity’

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Dipayan Mitra

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March 22, 2022

Russian court bans Facebook and Instagram, claiming the parent company Meta for ‘Extremist Activity,’ reported Reuters.

The charges of Facebook and Instagram supporting unethical practices got solidified when a judge from the Moscow court said that both the social media platforms were guilty of their activities.

However, Whatsapp, a chatting platform owned by Meta, will still be available for Russians to use in the country.

The groundbreaking decision comes after Russian authorities decided to file a criminal complaint against Meta for Facebook’s move to temporarily allow for threats of violence in Ukraine and a few other countries, including Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, and Romania.

The company also received criticism from the United Nations because of its amoral actions. Meta said regarding the episode that the company’s prime objective was to let Ukrainians express their anger over Russia’s military actions. Russian media reports claim that the decision would be imposed with immediate effect.

According to a survey, around 80 percent of Russians over the age of 14 use Whatsapp to communicate, which is why Russian authorities did not include WhatsApp in the ban imposed on Meta.

“The decision does not apply to the activities of Meta’s messenger WhatsApp, due to its lack of functionality for the public dissemination of information,” said the court regarding WhatsApp.

Meanwhile, a study of mobile internet traffic suggests that Telegram has recently surpassed WhatsApp as the most popular messaging app in the country.

Many reports have surfaced recently, citing that Russia is all set to launch its homegrown alternative for Instagram named Rossgram. The community description mentioned, “The Russian alternative to Instagram will be launched with the usual functionality and mobile applications for Android and iOS on March 28, 2022. Access will be open for standard users in April 2022.”

Meta also got involved in yet another controversy in Australia this week. An Australian watchdog sued Meta, alleging that the company’s social media platform Facebook is engaged in spreading false, misleading, or deceptive behavior by distributing fake advertisements depicting famous public personalities.

Enterprise AI CRM Startup Glia raises $45 million in Series D Funding

By

Dipayan Mitra

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March 22, 2022

Enterprise AI Customer Relationship Management startup Gila raises $45 million in its recently held series D funding round, increasing its valuation to over $1 billion.

The fresh funding round of Gila was led by New York-based-global venture capital and private equity firm Insight Partners. Other investors like Wildcat Capital Management and RingCentral Ventures also participated in the funding round.

Gila plans to use the newly raised funds to further invest in advanced artificial intelligence, messaging, voice, video, and analytics capabilities.

The new funds will be used mainly for research and development, allowing Glia to continue its decade-long commitment to digital customer service innovation. The funding will also enable Glia to expand into other markets in multiple regions, allowing it to bring the benefits of Digital Customer Service to financial institutions globally.

Managing Director at Insight Partners, Lonne Jaffe, said, “Most people haven’t yet experienced first-hand the magic and power of Digital Customer Service as consumers, which stems from Glia’s proven ability to create seamless, uninterrupted experiences across CoBrowsing, voice, chat, and video.”

He further added that they are excited to help Glia once more as they increase their R&D investment and continue to establish the global standard for Digital Customer Service.

United States-based digital customer service provider Gila was founded by Carlos Paniagua, Daniel Michaeli, and Justin DiPietro in 2012.

Companies can use Gila’s solution to identify and engage their highest-value web visitors via video, audio, chat, and co-browsing to increase online conversions and enhance customer service with just a single line of code. To date, the company has raised $152 million from investors over six funding rounds.

Co-founder and CEO of Gila, Daniel Michaeli, said, “As we build upon a decade of innovation, this capital will further extend our reach and help even more businesses across the globe reimagine how they connect with customers digitally.”

He also mentioned that they are ecstatic about their investors’ faith, which is reflected in the round’s valuation because they know they have only scratched the surface of what Glia can do.

VDO.AI and India Today Group Sign Annual Partnership for Video Monetization

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Dipayan Mitra

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March 22, 2022

Leading video supporting platform VDO.AI announces that it has signed an annual partnership with one of India’s top media houses, India Today Group, for video monetization.

According to the plan, VDO.AI will provide India Today Network with an effective Native Video Monetization Solution. The Native Video Units would provide an enhanced user experience while generating more cash for the India Today group.

This partnership will aid India Today in successfully modifying its site traffic and attracting a vast number of clients across its expanding showcase of sectors.

Head of Display at India Today Group, Zoheb Shaikh, said, “India Today’s association with VDO.AI has been working out very well since the past few months. With this evolved and dedicated association, we aim to expand our footprint with greater reach and distribution.”

He further added that they are looking forward to broadening the impact and giving the precise type and quality of content to their audience through VDO.AI’s creative video ad format tailor-made solutions.

VDO’s solutions include a contextual artificial intelligence engine that assesses user preferences. Then the engine offers personalized content recommendations to users to increase video watch time and audience engagement.

United States-based video supporting platform VDO.AI was founded by Amitt Sharma in 2017. The company specializes in offering a platform to organizations that assist them in realizing the full potential of video content and advertising, allowing them to increase their revenue by up to 50%.

Various prominent publicists on the internet use VDO.AI’s proven technological program, including video player, video streaming, video content, and video broadcasting, in an end-to-end offering.

“We design end-to-end experiences that are based on data-driven insights and scaled in real-time and firmly believe that publishers like India Today who embrace change will stay ahead of the curve,” said Founder and CEO of VDO.AI Amitt Sharma.

He also mentioned that they are delighted to be a part of India Today’s digital advertising journey and to be able to provide intelligent, high-impact solutions based on their knowledge.

Israel’s OurCrowd to Open new AI R&D Center in Abu Dhabi

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Dipayan Mitra

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March 22, 2022

Israeli Venture investing platform OurCrowd announces that it is ready to open its new artificial intelligence (AI) R&D center in Abu Dhabi.

OurCrowd says that the new R&D facility will be established by early June 2022 and would assist in investment decision-making.

According to Sabah al-Binali, a partner at OurCrowd, the Global AI Innovation Center would employ 50 engineers, with OurCrowd as the initial client. However, the service will be available to everybody.

Last year in November, the company received the green light to start its operations in the United Arab Emirates. In addition, six Israeli companies from OurCrowd’s portfolio are now operating in the United Arab Emirates.

OurCrowd plans to invest heavily in the project, which aims to analyze vast amounts of data. Al-Binali said, “Trying to build AI internally is very expensive, but we believe we can almost modularise and make it almost like a utility where you can just use it as a service.”

He expects that investments will flow once Emirati investors are able to visit Israel and see companies in person as the country sees Israel as a gateway to Southeast Asia.

Jerusalem-based venture investment platform providing company OurCrowd was founded by Jonathan Medved in 2013. The firm specializes in offering a platform that enables institutions and individuals to invest and engage in emerging enterprises.

OurCrowd has a massive customer base of more than 190,000 registered users. The experienced investment team at OurCrowd identifies and conducts research on thousands of companies and venture funds to capitalize on cutting-edge opportunities in multiple sectors and stages.

To date, OurCrowd has raised $197.5 million from investors like SoftBank Vision Fund, ORIX Group, UOB Venture, United Overseas Bank, and many others over six funding rounds.