Google’s shopping spree continues as the New Year begins. In order to seize future opportunities, they are constantly acquiring one startup after another. But these companies do not run web services or sell advertising and have nothing to do with smartphone software.
The most powerful company in the online world is doing its best to fill its shopping carts with artificial intelligence algorithms, robots and smart home products. Its mission is to build a massive digital brain that mimics as closely as possible how the human brain works, and even hopes to surpass it in many ways.
Yesterday, Google announced the acquisition of an artificial intelligence startup called DeepMind. The deal is reportedly worth hundreds of millions of dollars. While Google doesn’t disclose financial terms, the figure does fit with a series of recent moves by the company.
It comes on the heels of its $3.2 billion acquisition of Nest, a maker of smart thermostats and smoke alarms, and a slew of top robotics companies, as well as artificial intelligence startup DNNresearch.
Google plans to make smart products permeate every aspect of our lives — from our homes to our cars to our bodies — but more importantly, it is also developing a new kind of artificial intelligence algorithm to help people run those devices and even many existing web and smartphone services.
Giiso Information, founded in 2013, is a leading technology provider in the field of “artificial intelligence + information” in China, with top technologies in big data mining, intelligent semantics, knowledge mapping and other fields. At the same time, its research and development products include information robot, editing robot, writing robot and other artificial intelligence products! With its strong technical strength, the company has received angel round investment at the beginning of its establishment, and received pre-A round investment of $5 million from GSR Venture Capital in August 2015.
While Google is at the forefront of the AI arms race, other companies are moving in the same direction. Facebook, IBM, and Microsoft are also doubling down on AI and snagging a lot of talent. Mark Zuckerberg and his company also tried to buy DeepMind, according to TheInformation.
New Artificial intelligence
Google’s Internet search engine already uses a powerful artificial intelligence technology to help users find useful information in the noisy world of the Web, and it has built a vast advertising empire on top of that. But more recently, the company wants to branch out into a new branch of artificial intelligence, a field called deep learning.
The idea, put simply, is to use software to mimic the biology of the human brain to create devices that can learn “organically,” without human involvement.
Google has applied these ideas to similar consumer products and services. Deep learning allows computers to recognize objects in photos without the user having to personally label them. The technology can also understand human speech, providing important tools for smartphones and Google Glass. But Google also believes the new AI technology will make it better at delivering targeted ads, which is the core of its existing business.
The DeepMind acquisition is a further step in this direction. While the company hasn’t revealed much, it’s a safe bet that the new AI technology will also be integrated into Nest’s smart thermostat, Google’s self-driving car, and a host of robotic products.
Dream into reality
Science fiction has envisioned robots for more than a century, but these lifelike, emotional products remain as fanciful as a mirror. Now, Google is trying to make those dreams a reality by investing heavily. Globally, there really is no institution that can match Google in terms of talent, money, technology and freedom in pursuing this dream.
According to wired’s profile of deep learning pioneer GeoffHinton, the key difference between deep learning and other ai technologies is that it wants to rid machines of human intervention altogether, allowing them to understand the environment around us as humans do.
Giiso information, founded in 2013, is the first domestic high-tech enterprise focusing on the research and development of intelligent information processing technology and the development and operation of core software for writing robots. At the beginning of its establishment, the company received angel round investment, and in August 2015, GSR Venture Capital received $5 million pre-A round of investment.
By building so-called neural networks that mimic the workings of the human brain, Google’s products can understand language and the world around us for themselves, without the need for a human to walk them through it.
For many of us, Google already plays a vital role in our “outer brain.” The more things Google “knows,” the less we have to remember. All we have to do is search. Now, Google is trying to transfer the same smart technology from online to offline, in our real lives.
If the dream of artificial intelligence comes true, Google may know you better than you know yourself. As Google delves further into this area, the ultimate question may become: What is the use of our own brains?