DataRobot Adds Snowflake Integration & Automated Artificial Intelligence Reports

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June 18, 2021

DataRobot, the Boston-based data science company, integrates with Snowflake to streamline artificial intelligence reports. The latest DataRobot version 7.1, the company’s second major enterprise release, introduced MLOps management agents, time series model enhancements, and automated Artificial Intelligence (AI) reports. The company also mentioned that the goal is to guide business outcomes for enterprises through AI and to speed up the customer’s time to value (TTV).

This version of DataRobot has instigated MLOps management agents that engage with lifecycle management for AI and machine learning models. These MLOps can detect the model’s current state regardless of their modeled conditions or current running background. They can also automatically retrieve the model artifact and deploy or replace the model directly in their environment.

Version 7.1 renders push-down integration for the Snowflake and also improves the time series Eureqa model. With this, the Snowflake customers can see into automatic discovery and compute features in the snowflake data cloud. And can also run forecasting models on Eureqa.

The intriguing aspect of the new version is that it gives the leverage of turning deployed AI models into AI apps even without the baggage of coding. Scoring new data, performing what-if scenarios, optimizing the output by running simulations to obtain inputs, automated time prep for time series, and automatic identification of model projects, nowcasting, prediction and scheduling interface are the added advantages of the app builder.

“We’re thoroughly committed to creating a platform that empowers every individual from the most advanced data scientists to the everyday, non-technical business user to take advantage of AI. By easing the model lifecycle process and cutting down the time to value, this latest round of enhancements gives enterprises the tools they need to build better, manage, and see value from their AI projects,” says DataRobot SVP Nenshad Bardoliwalla in the press release.

Compose.ai Raises US$2.1 Million To Help Write Faster

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Dipayan Mitra

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June 18, 2021

Compose.ai raises US$2.1 million to build its own language model that would help others write faster. Compose.ai intrinsically is an auto-complete that works while web browsing.

The company is also developing an artificial intelligence, which would recognize and learn the voice of the user in order to provide a quicker and better response. Landan Sanford, Co-founder of Compose.ai, said that he believes in the coming five years, people won’t type every word they want to write.

Compose.ai is developing a Google Chrome extension that the customers can access without the need to get corporate permission. While explaining the working for their algorithm, Sanford described it as a multi-tier product.

The first tier learns from reading the web itself, learning English. The second tier deals with particular domains, like email. The third tier learns a user’s voice, and the fourth tier will be related to a company’s generalized approach to language.

It is a very interesting concept as this would enable the company to provide its workers a common language model that could offer word-choice and linguistic preference when they write. After the funding, the company is planning to hire a few experienced engineers to work with them.

Compose.ai Co-Founder Shuffett said that they wish to stay small for now. The start-up currently has three full-time employees and a few contractual workers. The product Compose.ai wants to create is not something simple. The founders said, “the personalization work that its product will execute for customers can be expensive if done incorrectly.”

They also added that they could, in the future, introduce an economical US$10 monthly subscription, but if executed in a naive fashion, the company might have to spend US$500 in technical costs to support the same subscription. But Compose.ai is confident that their subscription plans will perform well in financial terms.

RCMP Violates Privacy Act By Using Clearview’s AI Facial-Recognition Technology

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Dipayan Mitra

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June 17, 2021

According to Canada’s Privacy Commissioner, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) used Clearview AI facial recognition technology, violating the country’s Privacy Act. The Privacy Commissioner has submitted a special report about the same to the Parliament.

The Office of the Privacy Commissioner said that this AI technology allowed RCMP officials to compare Canadian citizen’s photographs with more than three billion images Clearview had acquired from the internet without the consent of the users.

The company’s method of image gathering represents a violation of the ‘Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA).’ In addition, the association of RCMP with Clearview puts the police in contravention of S.4 of the Privacy Act, said the OPC.

Dr. Brenda McPhail, Director of the Privacy, Technology and Surveillance Program at the Canadian Civil Liberties Association (CCLA), said, “Police aren’t allowed to use surveillance tools, if the information that feeds, creates or forms the basis for that tool was unlawfully acquired.” He also added, “It would mean that those bodies, that are duty bound to enforce our laws, would have a loophole that would allow them to break them, sort of at a whim.”

According to the report, RCMP continuously misled the OPC, firstly by denying usage of the technology. Later, RCMP said that the use was restricted to locate and identify children who have been victims of cyberbullying and online sexual abuse.

They later, in a statement to OPC, said that only 78 searches were made, but after investigating Clearview’s records, it was found that The RCMP searched more than 520 times. RCMP argued that the difference in data is because of multiple searches of the same individual, but the truth behind this statement is ambiguous. After investigation, it was found that only 6% of the searches were concerned with identifying victims of online sexual abuse.

PwC To Spend $12 Billion On Hiring, Expanding Expertise In AI And Cybersecurity

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Dipayan Mitra

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June 17, 2021

PwC has decided to spend US$12 billion by 2026 to expand its expertise and hire 100,000 new jobs in different areas like artificial intelligence (AI) and cybersecurity. Mr. Rayan said that the investment aims to better advise companies that face increasing inspections from investors on issues such as data privacy, sustainability, and diversity. “It’s important that our people have those skills,” he added.

PwC in 2019 said it is willing to invest US$3 billion in employee training and technology in a span of four years. Last year, the company said it had created more than 8,000 new jobs and had already hired 63,000 people worldwide to fill existing positions.

PwC, while declining to comment on the attrition rate of the company, said it had spent US$7.4 billion on talent acquisition and other areas. Many US-based companies are failing to fill existing job positions as potential workers are on edge. This US$12 billion investment of PwC is also to increase their market share, which is slowly decreasing.

On Tuesday, PwC said it aims to hire highly experienced workers in specific areas like governance, social and environmental issues and encourage introducing new products that involve Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML). Mr. Ryan also said that they are planning to acquire a few companies to expand their expertise.

In addition, the company is ready to spend US$1 billion on a global scale on technology to improve audit quality, which would help auditors to assess a broader range of risks, including cybersecurity.

Mr. Rayan said, “We believe this is critical to meet the need for increasing expectations on us as the audit becomes more complicated and as things like ESG get broader and brought into the audit.”

PwC is planning to train 55,000 employees on ESG issues and companies’ vision of net-zero carbon emission. According to the company’s annual reports, from 2010 to 2019, it witnessed 5% average revenue growth.

FedEx And Nuro Collaborates For Delivery In Houston

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Dipayan Mitra

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June 17, 2021

FedEx and Nuro collaborate to test AI-based delivery vehicles. The companies said they have been testing autonomous delivery vehicles since April in Houston. Nuro R2 is the vehicle that delivers packages as part of a multi-year multi-stage contract to pilot autonomous last-mile deliveries.

A Nuro spokesperson said this partnership aims to reduce human interference in costly and complicated deliveries. Nuro, in the past, has also partnered with Domino’s for autonomous pizza delivery in Houston.

Though none of the companies said the number of vehicles they have been testing, the two companies said that they have tested and deployed Nuro’s vehicles together. This collaboration will help FedEx and Nuro to consider a vast array of used cases such as multi-stop and booking-based deliveries.

In the later phase of this collaboration, Nuro will give FedEx access to Nuro’s next-gen self-driving car, which will result in the massive rollout of Nuro Bots in different markets. The first version of Nuro’s delivery vehicle named R1 started shipping in Scottsdale, Arizona, in 2018.

Rebecca Yong, VP of Advanced Technology and Innovation at FedEx, said, “FedEx is built on innovation and remains an integral part of our culture and business strategy. We are excited to work with industry leaders like Nuro as we continue to explore the use of autonomous technology within our business.”

The new R2 version comes with many new features like temperature control, increased cargo space, and a longer range. In November 2020, after its Series C funding round, Nuro’s total funding exceeded US$1 billion since its establishment in 2016. The financing round was led by T. Rowe Price Associates, which also included new investors like Baillie Gifford Fidelity Management & Research along with existing investors like Greylock and SoftBank. This partnership with Nuro is not FedEx’s debut in this field of autonomous delivery. In 2019, FedEx launched its FedEx Sameday bot concept for door-to-door delivery.

IIT Madras Offers Post Baccalaureate Fellowship In Artificial Intelligence & Data Science

By

Manisha Kalagara

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June 17, 2021

The Indian Institute of Technology(IIT) Madras is offering a fellowship for post baccalaureates in various areas of artificial intelligence and data science for 2021 at the Robert Bosch Centre for Data Science and Artificial Intelligence (RBCDSAI) for 1-2 years.

RBCDSAI at IITM was founded in 2017 with 47 researchers on board who are among the best in the artificial intelligence and data science landscape. The fellowship opportunities started in 2019. RBCDSAI has increased its candidate intake from 4 to 15 in the last two years, paving the way for graduates interested in the field of research and development from deep learning and networking to endorsing artificial intelligence in transport, agriculture, and health care facilities. With the increasing trend in the intake, it is likely to have more openings in 2021 too.

The benefits of the fellowship do not only include the experience from the finest institutes in India but also gives the candidates access to high-performance CPU/GPU infrastructure along with a rewarding stipend of ₹40,000 to ₹60,000 (per month), which will be based on the performance and the qualification of the candidate. With a bonus of a fully-funded trip to an AI and data science national conference throughout the candidate’s fellowship program.

Anyone who possesses the following credentials all across the country can apply for it. The certificates required are: bachelor’s degree and should not be above the age of 27, and demonstrate excellence in academics all across their undergraduate program. Good to have high-level proficiency in any coding language (preferably python/R/MATLAB) to obtain an added advantage.

The applicants should submit a copy of their online CV (Dropbox/OneDrive/Google Drive, etc.), a short research paper stating their purpose of the fellowship (300-500 words), a list of their relevant areas of research in the past or ongoing, and also a list of any relevant artificial intelligence or deep learning online courses (from NPTEL, Coursera, Udemy, Linkedin, etc.). To apply or obtain more information on the fellowship, candidates can visit https://rbcdsai.iitm.ac.in/Post_Bacc/.

The applicants need to apply before the 20th of every month, and the shortlisted candidates will be interviewed in person in the first week of the subsequent month.

GM-Backed Cruise Secures $5 Billion Credit Line For Self-Driving Car

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Dipayan Mitra

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June 17, 2021

General Motors’ majority-owned subsidiary, Cruise, has secured a new US$5 billion line of credit as it intends to commercialize its autonomous ride-hailing business. On Tuesday, this new credit was announced, which is being given by General Motors’ financing division for the purpose of purchasing Cruise’s self-driving origin shuttles.

GM plans to begin production of the same by 2023 in an unit located in Detroit. Dan Ammann, CEO of Cruise, claims that this brings Cruise’s valuation to over US$30 billion. He also said, “This is an incredibly exciting time for Cruise.” General Motors acquired Cruise in 2016 and has brought many investors like Microsoft, Walmart, Honda, and others.

But this time, instead of attempting to raise funds from outside, the company decided to provide Cruise the required credit internally. According to Cruise officials, GM has already begun assembling 100 pre-production units of Cruise Origin vehicles that would be built in Q2 of 2021 for testing purposes.

The Origin was first introduced in January 2020. The car is specifically designed as a driverless car. Hence, it lacks many traditional components like a steering wheel and pedals. The company has become the first autonomous car manufacturer to get a permit from the California Public Utilities Commission, which allows Cruise to give passenger rides in prototype driverless cars.

Commercializing autonomous vehicles has turned out to be way more difficult than it was expected a few years back. The challenges have led to a consolidation in the autonomous vehicle industry after many years of enthusiasm touting the technology as the upcoming multi-trillion dollar market.

Cruise earlier delayed their plan of launching their ride-hailing services in 2019 in San Francisco for testing purposes. The company has been providing ride-hailing services to its employees for many years in San Francisco.

Pony.ai To Launch Robotaxis In California By 2022

By

Dipayan Mitra

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June 17, 2021

Pony.ai is a robotaxi startup that mainly operates in the United States and China. Recently, the company has started testing driverless cars in California, aiming to launch its commercial service by 2022.

Pony.ai said that humanless car testing is happening daily on roads in Milpitas and Fremont, California. Alongside the United States, the company is also testing its robotaxis in Guangzhou, China.

Pony.ai’s CEO and CO-founder, James Peng, said, “Going completely driverless is key to achieving full autonomy and an indispensable catalyst to realizing our ambitious vision.”

Though Pony.ai is currently facing some regulatory hurdles as it needs the approval of the California Public Utilities Commission and California Department of Motor Vehicles for operating commercially, the company firmly believes that they would be able to launch the service in 2022.

Last month, the California state issued Pony.ai a permit to test a sum of six driverless taxis in a specific location that spans about 39 square miles. After Baidu, AutoX, Zoox, and Neuro, Pony.ai has become the 8th company to receive a driverless vehicle testing permit in the United States.

Pony.ai also began operating PonyPilot, which is a public robotaxi service in Irvine, California. Yamibuy, an e-commerce company, partnered with Pony.ai to start a new autonomous service called ‘last-mile delivery’ in the same area. According to Pony.ai officials, the delivery service was started to ease the supply of overwhelming online orders during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Last year, the company stated its valuation to be US$5.3 billion after receiving funding of US$1 billion from giants like Toyota. The company has also partnered with many industry-leading organizations like Hyundai, Bosch, and Toyota.

Dataiku Takes Its Machine Learning Platform To The Cloud

By

Dipayan Mitra

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June 16, 2021

Dataiku Takes Its Machine Learning Platform To The Cloud

Dataiku has introduced a cloud edition of its AI development platform that will reduce the work involved in developing custom machine learning models.

Dataiku is a New York-based company that has received $250million in funding from tech giants like Alphabet’s CapitalG venture. After secondary finance, it achieved unicorn status in 2019.

The company’s Artificial Intelligence (AI) platform helps companies develop machine learning models to perform many tasks like preparing training datasets.

Earlier, the customers needed to set up a dedicated infrastructure to run Dataiku’s software. The new managed edition of the software eliminates the need for any physical infrastructure as it is an entirely cloud-based service. This platform allows the customers to choose how they carry out tasks. They can develop a custom algorithm or can let the platform choose one using the AutoML feature.

The AutoML feature works by scrutinizing the kind of data a customer wants to process using its AI software and then finding out the best algorithm to perform the task efficiently. The software has a built-in AI library from which the desired algorithm is selected. Many organizations wish to build their custom AI algorithms. For this, Dataiku offers tools that data scientists use to develop a custom network or better known as hyperparameters.

Florian Douetteau, CEO of Dataiku, said, “We started developing Dataiku Online to address the needs of small and midsize businesses, in addition to startups, who don’t rely on on-premise technologies or custom clouds the way our enterprise customers do.”

Dataiku believes that this cloud-based service will help them expand further in the industry. The company’s platform is already being used by giants like Unilever PLC. and General Electronics Co. They are currently targeting small and midsized firms as now there is no need to set up a dedicated infrastructure.

Amazon India Launches ‘ML Summer School’ For Students

By

Dipayan Mitra

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June 16, 2021

Amazon India Launches ML Summer School For Students

On Sunday, Amazon India launched an integrated learning program to learn applied Machine Learning (ML) skills for students to make them ready for a career in technology. Amazon India, in a statement, said that considering the high demand for talent with this skill set across various industries, they had introduced the program- ML Summer School, which would help students learn in-depth about Machine Learning.

It is a three-day immersive program that would cover the fundamentals of Machine Learning and its practical implementation in the industry. The participants of the ML Summer School program will be identified through an online assessment.

Final year engineering students along with Masters, Ph.D. students across select tech campuses in the country, which includes Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Delhi, IIT Mumbai, IIT Kharagpur, International Institute of Information Technology (IIIT) Hyderabad, Birla Institute of Technology (BITS), National Institute of Technology (NIT) along with a few more Universities can take part in the ML Summer School.

Participants will get to learn about advanced Machine Learning techniques like the Probabilistic Graphical model and Deep learning along with their applications which can be used to solve specific business problems like search ranking and online advertising, catalog quality, and demand forecasting.

Students will also get access to the Amazon Research Days (ARD) conference, where they will get to know about trends in technology from the best industry experts in the world.

For those, who have prior knowledge of ML, this course will act as a refresher while additionally providing them a hands-on practical application of ML in the industry.

VP Indian Machine Learning at Amazon Rajeev Rastogi said, “With the pace of advancements in ML, we are proactively helping students to learn about the latest trends in the field of ML and apply them to solve real-world problems.”

Amazon India, in a blog, said that its machine learning team is driving innovations that would not only help Indians but customers worldwide.