Machines crunch numbers. Humans make decisions. That’s what we have been used to traditionally. But, artificial intelligence (AI) is all set to challenge and disrupt this division of labour. With AI becoming mainstream, machines will do both – crunch numbers and make decisions. Interestingly and somewhat predictably, in a way much better than what we humans do. Although as humans, we love to think we take the best decisions, the fact is, our decisions are often biased and based on emotions rather than logic and facts that machines use.
“AI will usher in a better world,” Pradeep Dubey, Intel Fellow & Director of Parallel Computing Lab, Intel Labs said at Intel India’s first AI Day held in Bengaluru on Tuesday. Referring to AI-based driverless cars, Dubey said that machines are becoming better drivers day by day while humans are getting worse with multiple distractions such as continuous use of mobile apps.
This is not the first time machines have made big promises. The success of machines winning over humans has been demonstrated in the past when IBM’s AI-based supercomputer Watson defeated two greatest champions (humans, of course) in American quiz show Jeopardy in 2011.
Technology research firm Gartner has predicted AI as one of top 10 strategic technology trends for 2017. “Over the next 10 years, virtually every app, application and service will incorporate some level of AI,” said David Cearley, vice president and Gartner Fellow. “This will form a long-term trend that will continually evolve and expand the application of AI and machine learning for apps and services.”
Intel said it is driving and democratising the AI computing era. In the Indian context, to engage the ecosystem of students, researchers, and developers, Intel India announced an AI Developer Education Program targeted at educating 15,000 scientists, developers, analysts, and engineers on key AI technologies including deep learning and machine learning.
“Our collaboration with the industry and the academia will help democratise AI, by reducing entry barriers for developers, data scientists and students. In India, we are targeting the BFSI, telecom, and e-commerce sectors, across High Performance Computing (HPC), Big Data, and Internet of Things, all of which are complementary to AI,” Prakash Mallya, Managing Director, Intel South Asia said.
In India, the onset of AI-based technologies is already evident in sectors of e-commerce and research, which have been already using data analytics. Krishnendu Chaudhury, Principal Scientist and head of Imaging at Flipkart said that the e-commerce company has recently launched deep learning-based visual recommendation and visual search to help consumers with an AI-based rich shopping experience. Chaudhary said Flipkart is using combination of visuals and semantics to help customers discover products better and faster.
Last month, Intel also announced a cross-Intel organisation – the Artificial Intelligence Products Group (AIPG) – aimed at aligning Intel’s AI efforts and building a set of standards for AI that ultimately brings down costs and makes AI more accessible. Intel also aims to set up an applied AI research lab dedicated to pushing the forefronts of computing to explore architectural and algorithmic approaches to inform future generations of AI.
BW Reporters
Ayushman is an award-winning business and tech journalist based in Bangalore, with diverse experience in journalism across newspaper, magazine and news wire. He is the recipient of the 15th annual Polestar Award in Jury's category for excellence in journalism in 2013. He is also an NSE-certified capital market professional (NCCMP) and driven by his interest, he has also attended hands-on workshops on cloud computing to stay on top of technology journalism
