Google Announces 20 Indian Startups for Its Startups Accelerator Programme

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July 5, 2023

Google 20 Indian startups for Startups Accelerator programme — Image Credits: Shutterstock

On Tuesday, Google announced that it has chosen 20 Indian firms for the seventh round of its Google for Startups Accelerator, including the railway ticket booking tool Trainman. The company stated that these Seed to Series A startups, which were picked from more than 1050 applicants, will aim to harness the power of generative artificial intelligence (AI).

The 20 India Startups include ActoFit, AlgoBio, Atsuya Technologies, AyuRythm, Blend, Cloudphysician, DentalDost, Expertia AI, Filo, KarmaLifeAI, Knorish, LimeChat, Mozark, Namaste Business, Neodocs, Qoruz, Rooter, Swasthya AI, Trainman, and Vitra.ai.

“These firms have now been included to the list of 137 startups in India that are part of the Google for Startups Accelerator. We kicked off the programme with a 1-week in-person bootcamp in Bengaluru on June 12 that was heavily focused on AI/ML and Generative AI, as well as training/workshops and office hours around product and design, tech, growth, and people, according to the company,” said Google.

In short, a three-month, equity-free accelerator programme for Seed to Series A software businesses in India is the Google for Startups Accelerator (GFSA) program. Over 130 firms in India have used it to speed up their growth thus far. Google began accepting applications for the seventh iteration of the accelerator programme in March of this year.

The business had then stated that Indian entrepreneurs operating in a variety of industries who were utilizing or planning to employ machine learning or artificial intelligence were eligible to apply and would receive mentoring and help in the areas of cloud, web, product strategy, UX, android, and growth.

Uttar Pradesh to Transform Key Cities into AI and IT Centers

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Sahil Pawar

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July 4, 2023

Uttar Pradesh transform key cities AI IT centers — Image Credits: NDTV

The government of Uttar Pradesh has unveiled a strategy to transform important cities into centers for artificial intelligence and information technology.

The action comes in response to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s statement last month from the US that India and the US are at the forefront of developments in AI and that there have been ground-breaking advances. The cities scheduled for the AI and IT-based makeover are Varanasi, Prayagraj (Allahabad), Gautam Buddha Nagar (Noida), Kanpur, and Lucknow.

As part of a larger plan to establish the five cities as future centers for IT and IT Enabled Services (ITeS), Lucknow has been designated as India’s first “AI City.” Nand Gopal Gupta, the industrial development minister for the state of Uttar Pradesh, was quoted as saying that technology and tech leadership would define the future of the world and that UP has made great strides to become a key center of AI, both nationally and internationally.

He said, “AI leadership means leadership of the world and our ‘double engine’ government is turbocharged to lead the tech revolution in the world. The goal of the anticipated AI and IT sector development in these five cities is to accelerate Uttar Pradesh’s transition to a trillion-dollar economy.”

A detailed road map was recently presented to Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath by officials. A high-level committee led by the chief secretary has been tasked by the CM with taking action to implement the idea right away. The Lucknow AI hub initiative would offer investors and businesses a whole value chain made up of AI start-ups, data centers, data analytics, AI-based training, and data forensics, among other things.

Data, AI in Healthcare to Add $25-30 Billion to India’s GDP by 2025, Says Nasscom

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Sahil Pawar

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July 4, 2023

Data AI healthcare $25-30 billion India’s GDP 2025 Nasscom — Image Credits: Sutterstock

India’s healthcare sector is undergoing a dynamic change that is centered on digital transformation. According to a report from the IT industry group Nasscom unveiled at an event, data and AI in healthcare have the potential to boost India’s GDP by $25 to $30 billion by 2025.

Ktech Nasscom Centre of Excellence (CoE) organized the 11th edition of the Life Sciences and Healthcare Innovation Forum (LHIF) and the 4th edition of the Healthcare Innovation Challenge (HIC), reiterating its commitment to upending the healthcare ecosystem for accessible and affordable patient care.

The forum is a seven-year-old initiative that has the support of the Karnataka government. It highlighted the necessity of adopting technology-driven digital healthcare solutions to provide patients with better, faster, and more timely access to medical facilities and services, especially in remote locations.

The forum reemphasized the necessity of the industry’s innovation and swift adoption of cutting-edge technologies. Additionally, it emphasized the necessity of putting strategic emphasis on creating infrastructure that will fuel healthcare innovation in the nation. Some of the main drivers will include telemedicine, health technology, data-focused healthcare, accessibility to primary care, and mobility of skilled talent.

Hidentity, KareXpert, I Am By Your Side, Autoyos, Expand My Business, Healthvectors, Vyli, Ignoimagine, Leucine BioTech, AiVolved, Janitri, and Expand My Business were a few of the startups who attended the event. The startups showcased their digital health technologies that improved healthcare facilities and guaranteed accessible healthcare delivery by utilizing the power of AI and IoT.

Andrew Ng introduces ‘Generative AI with LLMs’ with AWS

By

Tejaswini Kasture

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July 4, 2023

Andrew Ng Introduces 3 Gen AI courses — Image Source: Analytics Drift

Collaborating with Amazon Web Services (AWS), Andrew Ng, a pioneer in Machine Learning, founder of DeepLearning.AI, Landing AI, and co-founder of Coursera, has unveiled a new course on ‘Generative AI with Large Language Models’.

It is a three-week course based on generative AI with Large Language Models (LLMs) created by AWS and DeepLearning.AI. The course will provide an in-depth understanding of LLM architecture and how LLM works. In addition, the course will also guide how to effectively use LLMs in applications by determining the most appropriate model and implementing suitable training techniques.

The course also covers the full life-cycle of a generative AI project, and it focuses on specific techniques like Reinforcement Learning with Human Feedback (RLHF), zero-shot, one-shot, few-shot concepts with LLM, advanced prompting frameworks like ReAct, and even fine-tuning LLMs. The course is available on Coursera and is especially designed for data scientists, ML engineers, research engineers, and anyone interested in generative AI.

Apart from Andrew Ng, the course will be instructed by Chris Fregly, principal solutions architect at AWS; Antje Barth, principal developer advocate at AWS, and Mike Chambers, developer advocate at AWS. Andrew Ng announced the courses in a post on LinkedIn.

Andrew Ng is an AI and ML expert who is always prompt regarding people learning and adapting to generative AI. In the previous month, he introduced three new Generative Al courses on Building Systems with the ChatGPT API, LangChain for LLM Application Development, and How Diffusion Models Work. In collaboration with OpenAI, he also offered a free short course, ‘ChatGPT Prompt Engineering for Developers,’ designed to help developers effectively utilize LLMs.

Twitter Announces Daily Reading Limits Due to Excessive Data Scraping

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Sahil Pawar

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July 3, 2023

Twitter daily reading limits due data scraping — Image Credits: AD

Elon Musk recently announced additional “temporary” limits on the number of posts users can view. He continued to blame these restrictions on AI businesses extracting vast amounts of data for Twitter. Now, only 600 posts can be viewed daily by unverified accounts, and only 300 can be viewed daily by “new” unverified accounts.

To address extreme levels of data scraping & system manipulation, we’ve applied the following temporary limits:

– Verified accounts are limited to reading 6000 posts/day
– Unverified accounts to 600 posts/day
– New unverified accounts to 300/day
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 1, 2023

The restrictions for verified accounts still only allow reading up to 6,000 posts per day. This applies accounts presumably whether they’re purchased as a part of the Twitter Blue subscription, granted through an organization, or verification Elon forced on people like Stephen King, LeBron James, and anyone else with more than a million followers.

The rate restrictions would “soon” rise to 8,000 tweets for verified users, 800 for unverified users, and 400 for brand-new unverified accounts, Musk tweeted shortly after that.

Rate limits increasing soon to 8000 for verified, 800 for unverified & 400 for new unverified https://t.co/fuRcJLifTn
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 1, 2023

The restrictions came into effect a day after Twitter abruptly began denying access to users who aren’t logged in. Musk claimed that this was necessary because a few hundred organizations (possibly more) were scraping Twitter data extensively, to the point where it was affecting the real user experience.”

Musk has tried to monetize Twitter in a number of different ways over the past few months, and the change is only one of them. Just three months after launching the redesigned $8 per month Twitter Blue pay-for-verification programme, the company announced a three-tier API update in March that will start charging for the use of its API.

TSRTC Buses to Get AI-powered Driver Monitoring Systems

By

Sahil Pawar

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July 3, 2023

TSRTC Buses AI-powered Driver Monitoring Systems — Image Credits: TSRTC

In an effort to improve road safety, public transport buses in Telangana will soon be equipped with driver monitoring systems (DMS), which include CCTV cameras that can identify inattentive or fatigued drivers.

In up to 190 Telangana State Road Transport Corporation (TSRTC) buses, DMS with CCTV cameras are likely to be installed, either right away or gradually. This initiative is a part of Project iRASTE, which makes use of artificial intelligence to lessen crash rates and mishaps on roadways. Tenders for this have been floated.

The system will track the driver’s facial expressions and eye movements in real-time, analyze them, and issue voice alerts within a few seconds in the event of driver distraction, or instances where the driver is frequently seen looking outside the bus.

Alerts will be either in Telugu, English or Hindi. Additionally, the system will transmit alarms if the driver is not wearing a seatbelt, is sleepy, or is smoking. The DMS will identify the driver using facial recognition technology and trace the journeys he has taken.

The technology will examine both the top safest and most reckless drivers using the data at hand. Motion is captured by CCTV cameras that are mounted on the windscreen.

There are 200 buses equipped withAdvanced Driver Assistance System (ADAS) along the corridors connecting Hyderabad to Vijayawada, Hyderabad to Bengaluru, and Hyderabad to Nizamabad. The plan calls for adding DMS to the current ADAS. Buses that operate on long-distance routes are likely to have the DMS fitted.

Meta Gives a Glimpse of Its Twitter Rival Threads on Google Play

By

Sahil Pawar

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July 3, 2023

Meta gives glimpse Twitter rival Threads Google Play — Image Credits: AD

Early this morning, Alessandro Paluzzi, a developer who frequently examines app code to discover hidden functionality, tweeted that Meta’s Twitter rival, Threads, has been made available on the Google Play store. But given that the app is no longer accessible, it appears it was a mistake.

#Instagram has released Threads (aka Barcelona) app on the Play Store https://t.co/v82PwE5Mgm pic.twitter.com/9rox8GgZfL
— Alessandro Paluzzi (@alex193a) July 1, 2023

The login screen, which allows users to sign in with their Instagram accounts, and another screen with a list of the accounts they follow on Instagram, so that users can choose who to follow on Threads, were among the screenshots Paluzzi provided.

Here's the store listing screenshots 👇🏻 pic.twitter.com/kBK9OSRhNF
— Alessandro Paluzzi (@alex193a) July 1, 2023

Threads resembles Twitter a lot. According to the screenshots, a new post will display character counts along with a little paperclip for attaching anything else that Threads will allow you to attach to posts. There are icons for liking, reposting, reacting to, and sharing posts when viewing them, and user photos appear in little circles. Even the blue checkmarks that Twitter uses for Instagram are present.

Since January, Threads has been in development at Meta under the title of “Project 92.” Chris Cox, chief product officer at Meta, who was introducing Threads at an internal company meeting said, “We’ve been hearing from creators and public figures who are interested in having a platform that is sanely run, as opposed to Twitter.”

Although Meta has not given the app an official release date, the fact that it has appeared in the Google Play store suggests that one is about to come. There is a lot of discussion regarding what this development would entail.

Goa to Install AI Cameras in 70 Accident-prone Zones to Enhance Road Safety

By

Sahil Pawar

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July 3, 2023

Goa install AI cameras 70 accident-prone zones — Image Credits; Stock Images

Authorities in Goa have selected 70 priority areas as accident-prone zones around the state in an effort to minimize traffic accidents and improve road safety. By December, artificial intelligence (AI) cameras will be installed at these areas to track traffic and catch drivers breaking the law. This was decided during a State Road Safety Council meeting on Friday at the Altinho ITMS control center.

Rajan Satardekar, Director of Transportation, emphasized the necessity for technological intervention in these accident-prone areas because it is getting harder for law enforcement to personally monitor them. In these regions, erratic driving and damaged traffic medians, which allow two-wheelers to shift lanes carelessly, have been recognised as two of the main causes of safety problems and accidents.

The transport department intends to deploy more staff to the backend to remotely monitor these areas in order to solve this issue. The best locations and camera positioning angles are being discussed in collaboration with the traffic cell of the Goa police. Additionally, finalization is being made to the associated expenditures for placing cameras at these high-priority areas.

To further punish drivers who violate the law, the list of violations recorded by AI cameras will be circulated. Since June 1, the traffic cell and the transport department have been using AI cameras to detect offenses and issue challans.

Due to this, common traffic violations including speeding, riding without a helmet, operating a vehicle without a seatbelt, and using a phone while driving have come under more scrutiny.

According to earlier reports, these high-resolution cameras have the ability to follow automobiles, spot speeding cars, and even find out whether a car has been reported stolen. It can run on Ethernet IP-based systems. Goa seeks to strengthen its Intelligent Traffic Management Systems (ITMS) and make considerable headway in reducing road accidents by installing AI cameras in accident-prone regions and broadening the scope of identified breaches.

Meta Releases Clues on How AI is Used for Instagram and Facebook

By

Suchitra Shenoy

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July 3, 2023

Meta, the parent company of Instagram and Facebook, released tools and information to help users understand how AI influences what they see on its apps.

The introduction of nearly two dozen explainers, focused on features like Instagram Stories and Facebook’s news feed, explains how Meta selects the content to recommend to users. Meta’s move is part of its “wider ethos of openness, transparency, and accountability,” as per the blog post of Meta’s President of Global Affairs, Nick Clegg.

In the blog post, Clegg also writes, “With rapid advances taking place with powerful technologies like generative AI, it’s understandable that people are both excited by the possibilities and concerned about the risks.”

With European lawmakers’ swift advancement of legislation, there could be requirements for explanation and transparency from companies that use AI. US lawmakers hope to begin working on similar legislation later this year.

Meta’s newly-released 22 system cards for Facebook and Instagram will provide information on how its AI systems rank content and predict what content might be most relevant to its users. They cover feeds, reels, stories, and other surfaces that people visit to find content from the people or accounts they follow. The system cards also cover AI systems that recommend “unconnected” content from accounts, people, or groups they don’t follow.

Now, users can customize their feeds, on both Facebook and Instagram, by accessing a menu from individual posts. While Meta had only offered users the ability to tell Instagram to show less, not more, the release of its new tools provides the ability to ask Instagram to supply more of a certain content type.

Meta will also provide a content library and an application programming interface (API) featuring a variety of content from Facebook and Instagram for researchers to study its platforms.

Additionally, the platform is expanding the Why Am I Seeing This? feature to Facebook Reels and Instagram Reels tab and Explore over the coming weeks. The feature was previously found in some ads and Feed content on both Facebook and Instagram.

“Godfather of AI” Urges Governments to Safeguard Humanity

By

Amulya Reddy Avanaganti

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July 3, 2023

Godfather of AI Geoffrey Hinton — Image Credits: Pindula

Speaking at the Collision tech conference, AI scientist Geoffrey Hinton, widely known as the “Godfather of AI,” urged governments to intervene and ensure that machines do not seize control of society. Hinton, who recently left Google after a decade of service, emphasized the need to address the potential risks associated with AI, especially after the release of the captivating ChatGPT.

Addressing a packed audience of more than 30,000 industry professionals in Toronto, Hinton highlighted the importance of understanding how AI could potentially try to take control. He expressed his concerns by stating, “Before AI is smarter than us, I think the people developing it should be encouraged to put a lot of work into understanding how it might try and take control away. Right now, there are 99 very smart people trying to make AI better and one very smart person trying to figure out how to stop it taking over, and maybe you want to be more balanced.”

Hinton’s concerns regarding AI were not without substance, as he emphasized the need to address the risks seriously. He stated, “I think it’s important that people understand this is not science fiction; this is not just fear-mongering. It is a real risk that we must think about, and we need to figure out in advance how to deal with it.”

In addition to potential control issues, Hinton also expressed concerns about how AI could worsen inequality. He expressed his fear that the benefits of AI adoption would primarily flow to the wealthy, leaving workers behind. “The wealth isn’t going to the people doing the work. It will go into making the rich richer and not the poorer, and that’s very bad for society,” he added.

Hinton also addressed the dangers of fake news generated by AI-powered bots like ChatGPT. He expressed hope that AI-generated information could be watermarked, similar to how central banks watermark actual money. The European Union is currently exploring such a technique as part of its AI Act, which is being negotiated by legislators to establish AI standards in Europe.