ImageBind, an open-source AI model that can simultaneously learn from six different modalities, has been released by Meta. Machines can now comprehend and link various types of data, including text, image, audio, depth, temperature, and motion sensors. Without having to be taught on every potential modality combination, machines can learn a single shared representation space using ImageBind.
ImageBind is significant because it gives machines the ability to learn holistically. Researchers might investigate novel possibilities by fusing various modalities, such as developing multimodal search tools and building immersive virtual environments. By effortlessly generating richer media, ImageBind could help enhance content recognition and moderation while fostering creative design.
Meta‘s greater objective of developing multimodal AI systems that can learn from all kinds of data is reflected in the creation of ImageBind. Researchers now have additional options to create fresh, all-encompassing AI systems, thanks to ImageBind, as the number of modalities rises.
AI models that rely on many modalities have a lot of room to grow because of ImageBind. ImageBind learns a single joint embedding space from image-paired data that enables several modalities to “talk” to one another and discover relationships without being observed simultaneously. This makes it possible for other models to comprehend novel modalities without the need for time-consuming training.
A larger vision model may be advantageous for non-visual tasks like audio classification because of the model’s strong scaling behavior, which shows that its performance increases with the strength and size of the vision model. Along with audio and depth classification tasks, ImageBind performs better than earlier research in zero-shot retrieval.
At its annual Think conference today, IBM unveiled IBM Watsonx, a new AI and data platform that will allow businesses to scale and hasten the impact of AI with reliable data.
Enterprises utilizing AI today require access to a complete technology stack that enables them to develop, test, and roll out AI models across their organization with reliable data, speed, and governance, all this in one location and across any cloud environment.
With Watsonx, IBM is providing businesses with a seamless end-to-end AI workflow that will make AI easier to adapt, scale, and access foundation models that have been curated and trained by IBM as well as open-source models. It will act as a data store to enable the gathering and cleaning of training and tuning data, and a toolkit for governance of AI.
Arvind Krishna, chairman and CEO of IBM, said, “With the development of foundation models, AI for business is more powerful than ever. Using AI is vastly more scalable, economical, and effective when foundation models are used.”
“In order for clients to be more than just users and gain the benefits of AI, we designed IBM Watsonx specifically for the needs of businesses. While maintaining complete control over their data, companies can swiftly train and deploy customized AI capabilities across their whole business with IBM Watsonx,” he added.
Clients will have access to the set of tools, technology, infrastructure, and consulting skills needed to develop their own AI models on their own data, or to enhance and modify existing models, and then deploy them at scale in a more dependable and open environment to promote commercial success.
Chinese police detained an individual on Sunday in what may be the first instance of someone reportedly spreading false information using the hugely popular AI chatbot ChatGPT.
According to the South China Morning Post, authorities in the northern Chinese province of Gansu say they detained a man for allegedly fabricating news reports about a train accident that claimed nine lives.
The man, whose last name was given as Hong by the authorities, was said to have created the “fake” news using ChatGPT and propagated it via numerous blogs online. Hong was expressly accused of “picking fights and causing trouble,” a general political charge leveled at activists and dissidents.
Several hundred users on the Chinese blogging platform Baijiahao are said to have posted the disputed posts. Police allegedly claimed that Hong circumvented Baijiahao’s rules on submitting the same content to several accounts. He used ChatGPT to create various versions of the news article, resulting in about 15,000 clicks.
Hong apparently owns a business that runs numerous blog-style websites. According to reports, the platforms are registered in Shenzhen as a significant big tech manufacturing and business center in southern China.
OpenAI has released Shap-E, a 3D asset conditional generative model. According to the paper, Shape-E can directly generate the parameters of implicit functions that can be rendered as both textured meshes and neural radiance fields (NeRF) with a single text prompt, in contrast to conventional 3D generative models that provide a single output representation.
Shap-E is one of the few OpenAI products that is available as open source, and it can be found on GitHub together with the model weights, inference code, and an example.
The paper claims that Shap-E receives training in two phases. First, an encoder that deterministically maps 3D assets into the parameters of an implicit function is trained. Second, using the encoder’s data, a conditional diffusion model is trained.
The research states that when trained on a sizable dataset of linked 3D and text data, “our models can generate complex and diverse 3D assets in just a few seconds.”
The intriguing thing about OpenAI’s Shap-E is that it converges more quickly and generates samples with an equivalent or greater quality than Point-E, despite modeling a higher-dimensional, multi-representation output space.
Even though the 3D objects that are produced could appear pixelated and rough, the models can be built using just one sentence. Another drawback of this is that, as the study points out, it currently struggles to locate numerous attributes and can only produce objects with single object prompts and basic attributes.
According to reports, OpenAI, the AI research business behind well-known language models like ChatGPT and Dall-E 2, increased its losses to $540 million in 2022 as a result of rising ChatGPT maintenance costs.
The company’s goal is to create artificial general intelligence (AGI), an AI capable of enhancing its own capabilities, and is now expecting to raise upto $100 billion in the upcoming years.
The Information claims that OpenAI’s losses are also a result of the high cost of hiring qualified personnel, particularly recruiting engineers and research specialists. As more consumers utilize AI technology and the company develops new software, the cost of training machine-learning models and getting fresh data sets is also anticipated to rise.
Even though OpenAI’s revenue has increased, spending hundreds of millions of dollars annually just a few weeks after the launch of a paid edition in February, expenditures are probably going to keep going up. Data prices are anticipated to soar as the AI arms race heats up as a result of the introduction of policies by websites like Reddit and StackOverflow that charge AI firms for access to their previously free datasets.
According to CEO Sam Altman, OpenAI may attempt to raise $100 billion to fund the development of AGI, a move that some experts fear could result in an AI monopoly. By purchasing the domain name AI.com and applying for the trademark “GPT,” OpenAI has already started moving in this direction.
According to Wall Street Journal, Google plans to incorporate conversational interfaces powered by AI short video clips and social media posts into search results. According to corporate records and persons with knowledge of the situation, they would push the service further away from its conventional structure, also known as the “10 blue links.”
In response to the changing ways that people get information on the internet, Google plans to make big changes to its search engine. With a focus on meeting the requirements of young people all over the world, the goal is to make the search engine more interesting, customized, and relatable.
According to the documents, Google intends to improve its search engine by making it even more “visual, snackable, personal, and human.” The documents state that as part of the move, it intends to include more human voices and support content creators the same way it has in the past with websites.
The search engine giant is anticipated to introduce new features that enable users to have conversations with an artificial intelligence programme, a project code-named “Magi,” during its annual I/O developer conference this coming week, according to several sources with knowledge of the situation.
For years, Google, owned by Alphabet, has made only minor changes to the look and feel of search, which drives the advertising sector and generated more than $162 billion in revenue in 2017. However, this is altering due to the rapid growth of AI chatbots and short-video apps like TikTok, both of which have drawn in younger users.
The Biden Administration announced a broad range of planned actions on Thursday to help reduce some of the risks that these developing technologies pose to the American public. This announcement came ahead of a meeting between Vice President Kamala Harris and the leaders of America’s four top AI tech companies: Alphabet, OpenAI, Anthropic, and Microsoft.
This includes requesting the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to draft policy guidance for federal employees, asking leading AI companies to commit to participating in a “public evaluation” of their AI systems at DEFCON 31. It also includes allocating $140 million to the establishment of seven new AI research and development centers as part of the National Science Foundation.
A senior administration official stated during a call with reporters on Wednesday that “the Biden Harris administration has been leading on these issues since long before these latest generative AI products debuted last autumn.”
In an effort to help guide the design, development, and deployment of AI and other automated systems to protect the rights of the American public, according to a White House news release, the Administration revealed its “AI Bill of Rights” “blueprint” last October.
“In a time of rapid innovation,” the administration document continued, “it is essential that we make clear the values we must advance and the rights we must protect. We have provided business, legislators, and the people creating these technologies with some clear ways that they can limit the risks with the framework for an AI bill of rights.”
Vice President Kamala Harris and other top officials from the Biden administration will meet with top executives from leading technology companies, including Google, Microsoft, OpenAI, and Anthropic, to discuss critical concerns relating to artificial intelligence (AI).
The White House representative who confirmed the discussion emphasized that President Joe Biden expects businesses to give their products’ safety a priority before making them available to the general public.
The main challenges raised by the rapid development of AI technology include privacy invasions, bias, and the possible spread of frauds and false information. While acknowledging that it is too soon to say whether AI is dangerous, US President Joe Biden emphasized that technology companies have a duty to make sure that their products are secure in April.
He continued, “Social media has already shown the damage that strong technologies can do without the proper safeguards.” The administration has been aggressively seeking public feedback on suggested accountability mechanisms for AI systems as worries about how AI may affect national security and education rise.
Recently, representatives from the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy and the Domestic Policy Council published a blog post cautioning about the potential hazards that AI can present to workers.
Senior members of the administration, including Chief of Staff Jeff Zients, National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan, and Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo, are expected to attend the meeting on Thursday.
When developing a project-based business, data is a crucial metric to keep in mind at all times. What better way to control and manage your company’s data and information than to use a project-based ERP system?
FirstBit is a leading ERP in the UAE that provides a range of IT services and solutions that help businesses grow. FirstBit services are accessible as on-premises or cloud-based ERP software for all contracting and distribution enterprises. They assist these organizations in streamlining core processes and increasing departmental cooperation.
Companies may increase project efficiency, manage project financials and accounting, and track real-time online inventories using FirstBit’s Project ERP software. Additional features include a comprehensive reporting tool that can deliver real-time reports whenever and wherever they are required. Real-time project costing data, automation of all HR and payroll procedures, and complete automation of sales procedures to ensure they can provide lucrative contracts.
What Is Project-Based ERP?
Image source: QAD
Project-Based ERP is an enterprise resource planning system developed for businesses or companies that value projects as a significant aspect of their operations. A project-based ERP system manages and integrates a company’s financials, supply chain, operations, and human resource activities, as well as the distribution and flow of information across departments. It can also be called an information management system.
Project-based enterprise resource planning systems are more detailed and complete than traditional ERP systems. Project-based ERPs should boost the success of projects and businesses’ overall growth. They also assist organizations in streamlining and automating their project management procedures. This prevents projects from being delayed and enables the establishment of effective resource management workflows.
Companies value project-based ERP systems because they aid in resource planning by integrating the processes required to run their company into a single system. Project-based ERP can be deployed as an on-site or cloud-based ERP system.
Still, cloud-based ERP software is preferred nowadays since it connects and ties many business processes inside a company to ensure everything runs efficiently. The overall goal of project-based ERP systems is to improve a company’s growth and profitability. Project-based businesses include those in the construction, manufacturing, education, healthcare, retail, and other professional services industries.
Why Project-Based ERP Systems?
When businesses that value projects as an important aspect of their operations want to execute, most financial and corporate advisors recommend project-based ERP systems. But why is that? Traditional ERP systems are still in use and have a lot to offer, but why should you choose project-based ERP systems?
One of the key factors is that project-based ERP systems have project-based KPIs to support organizational and project goals, which come with comprehensive accounting information for the project.
As you have to decide based on real-time information generated by these systems, project-based ERP helps businesses maximize productivity and revenue.
Another reason, among many others, is that the expense framework is customized for each project at the right time. It also serves as a resourcing tool, informing project managers about what resources and skills are available at a particular time and for a particular project.
A Project-Based ERP System Should Have the Following Features
Image source: Informatics system.
While it is widely acknowledged that project-based ERP solutions are the most effective for project-based organizations, the following explains what ERP features and benefits you should look for in project-based ERP systems.
1. Project Management
Different processes may be centralized and integrated using project-based ERP systems. They provide a well-balanced schedule, attainable milestones, and the resources to implement the essential operations of several departments within a corporation necessary for a project’s execution. Budgets, activities, and their logical sequence are all disclosed, together with the resources needed to carry out time-based activities and other tasks that will be completed concurrently.
2. Human resource management (HRM)
A project-based ERP system preserves personnel data in an automated format, allowing project managers to assign work more quickly. This software also assists throughout the following processes: recruiting, training, resource planning and management, payroll, time tracking, and attendance tools.
3. Customer relationship management (CRM)
An ERP system for project-based businesses has to include a CRM that supports managing, tracking, and forecasting opportunities. Project-based ERP is appropriate for the extensive client cooperation and relationship-building that define project-based industries. In planning future initiatives, for instance, it is important to identify weak points in the sales cycle and the clientele that frequently returns.
4. Procurement
The project-based ERP system must manage raw materials or completed items from planning through approval, procurement, shipment, and receipt. Businesses don’t have to enter POs into separate systems when purchasing resources integrated into their project management software. The system can automate invoices and payroll in the ways you choose, reducing over-and under-buying.
5. Inventory management
Inventory management is critical to project-based systems, and the system should display current inventory levels down to the stock-keeping unit level and update those quantities in real time. Project-based ERP systems enable businesses to handle inventory, allowing them to stockpile enough to satisfy projected requests. They also track crucial inventory data.
For Which Types of Businesses Are Project-Based ERP Solutions Most Efficient?
Companies should adopt project-based ERP solutions to manage their businesses effectively because they bring significant improvements in multiple areas. The businesses that benefit the most from project-based ERP systems are listed below.
1. Construction
Construction companies revolve around projects. Many processes are involved in developing a construction project, such as asset management, scheduling, bidding, project management, and contractor management. With the help of ERP for construction industries, these various tasks and activities can be integrated into one complete solution, where businesses have all the tools to manage a project’s full lifecycle.
The construction industry’s project-based ERP allows you to use it however best meets your needs. These systems assist construction organizations in streamlining their operations through automated processes. Other advantages of employing ERP software include accurate project planning and analysis, cost estimation, and income generation. Project-based ERP systems are essential to construction projects, and if unanticipated events occur, the lack of project-based ERP might harm the project.
2. Manufacturing
ERP systems that are project-based make a complicated process easy. Project-based ERP software offers a wide range of advantages in the manufacturing industry, including reducing total operating expenses for manufacturing firms. These project-based ERP systems enhance a manufacturing company’s decision-making ability by offering extensive insights and visibility into every organizational division.
Besides, a project-based ERP system improves a company’s competency, increases production, and aids organizations in maintaining positive client relationships.
Manufacturing firms that adopt project-based systems also benefit from precise production planning and enhanced inventory management. These benefits, coupled with optimized process scheduling and well-coordinated distribution networks, help increase product on-time delivery. Communication between the many departments of the business, including accounting and finance, procurement, production, and operations, is simple.
3. Education
Academic and research institutes may find a project-based ERP software system to be a useful resource.
It is helpful in that it may digitize administrative tasks, minimize paperwork to the absolute minimum, and unify the whole educational facility, centralizing the information to make data administration easier. The project-based ERP system can manage enormous data volumes and create bulk reports.
In addition, it helps manage internal and external resources and control operations like payment of fees, libraries, student registration and administration, courses and curriculum, examinations and results, and more. All contribute to enhanced productivity and improved performance.
4. Hospitality
A project-based ERP system can assist businesses in the hospitality industry in establishing a comprehensive management system. There are many difficult-to-manage jobs in the hospitality industry, and project-based ERP helps to automate these processes. Examples include managing inventory, overseeing and planning employee schedules, scheduling client appointments, and operating the front desk efficiently.
Project-based ERP software’s automated workflows can help you save time and feel less stressed. The hospitality industry may use ERP software to maintain all critical information in one place, reducing duplication and contradicting data such as double-booked rooms. Real-time monitoring of all activities and services is possible with project-based ERP systems.
5. Healthcare
The healthcare business has developed rapidly over the years, and project-based ERP has been a key contributor to that growth. Project-based ERP solutions have always aided this economic sector with costs and regulatory requirements. A project-based ERP system integrates data from many healthcare departments to build a single database and enables medical professionals to make prompt choices.
With the help of this system, hospitals and other healthcare facilities may efficiently manage their financial aspects and handle the easy sourcing and purchase of necessary equipment and facilities. Healthcare organizations can save on inventory and administrative expenses by using a project-based ERP software solution. Other benefits of using ERP software in the health sector include increased patient safety, simple access to medical records, and patient confidentiality.
6. Retail
Project-based ERP is now a crucial component of the retail sector. The retail industry’s system is useful for meeting rising client expectations. Project-based ERP enables diverse departments in an organization to communicate information in real time, ensuring that all business operations function smoothly.
A project-based ERP system provides a dependable, easy, and efficient management solution for checking warehouse levels in real time, allowing businesses to verify proper stock levels. Customers and business owners will always know which products are in stock and which need to be restocked. Also, project-based ERP systems improve communication between suppliers and business partners through supply chain collaboration software.
Conclusion
There it is — a thorough explanation of project-based ERP systems and the industries they are useful for. They offer a well-balanced structure that makes it easier to manage and integrate their key operations while boosting productivity. Even though project-based ERPs are effective, businesses must determine whether these systems are compatible with their various tasks and activities before implementing them.
Former DeepMind and LinkedIn co-founders have introduced an AI chatbot through their new company, Inflection AI. The most recent project from Mustafa Suleyman and Reid Hoffman, the innovative AI chatbot Pi offers a brand-new perspective on AI personal assistants.
Different from Google Bard or OpenAI’s ChatGPT, the chatbot was created to be “supportive, smart, and there for you anytime,” claims the business. It is marketed by the firm as an AI that helps humans more as a companion than as a personal assistant for menial jobs.
Today we are announcing the release of the first version of @heypi_ai, your personal AI.
Pi stands for “personal intelligence” because it provides infinite knowledge based on your unique needs.
Additionally, this seems to be Pi’s most distinctive feature in a sea of chatbots built to generate personalized responses to precisely crafted questions.
“Do you have a query? Want to vent? Do you need an epiphany? You’re prepared to change? Getting nowhere today? Let’s discuss,” reads the Pi chat’s official Twitter handle’s description. As it offers infinite knowledge based on the user’s needs, Pi, according to the company, stands for personal intelligence.
According to Inflection, the Pi chatbot is a novel breed of helpful and compassionate computer programme. According to the business, billions of lines of text from the public internet have been fed to the chatbot in order to train it. This enables the Pi chatbot to interact with users and respond to a range of queries.
