ConnectingAI: Meta and Google announce new in-house AI chips; The US is betting big on AI chips; How artists are using AI to create very offline art — April 16, 2024
Bits and bites of how hardware enables the future of AI, the latest technological advancements and my favorite news in AI this week.
Top ConnectingAI articles of the week
1- Meta and Google announce new in-house AI chips: Meta just announced it’s pushing further into the AI chip race, coming right on the heels of Google’s own announcement of its Axion AI chip. Both companies are touting their new semiconductor models as key to the development of their AI platforms.
2- The US is betting big on AI chips: The Biden administration is providing billions of dollars for semiconductor research, development, manufacturing, and workforce development through the CHIPS and Science Act. Universities can be a fertile ground for recruiting talent to help support the semiconductor industry in building AI chips.
3- Meta’s new AI chips run faster than before: Meta said the next generation of its custom AI chips will be more powerful and able to train its ranking models much faster. The chips are designed to help make training more efficient and inference easier.
4- Google unveils Arm-based data center processor, new AI chip: Google revealed the details of a new version of its data center AI chips. Google plans to offer the Arm-based central processing unit (CPU) called Axion via Google Cloud. The company said it has superior performance to x86 chips, and general-purpose Arm chips in the cloud.
5- Intel releases new AI Gaudi 3 accelerator: Intel unveiled its latest AI hardware called Gaudi 3 AI. The Gaudi 3 AI accelerator was built to increase the speed and efficiency of parallel AI operations.
6- Amazon CEO: "We're deeply investing" in generative AI: Amazon CEO Andy Jassy revealed details about the company's investments in generative AI. The "bottom layer" of Amazon's AI strategy is to help developers and companies train models and produce predictions. Amazon says having its own custom AI training and inference chips will bring down costs for customers.
AI piqued my interest
1- How artists are using AI to create very offline art: Some artists are experimenting with how they can use generative AI as a tool to enhance their creative work. More than 200 prominent musical artists said they believe that “when used responsibly, AI has enormous potential to enhance creativity.”
2- New AI method captures uncertainty in medical images: In biomedicine, segmentation involves annotating pixels from an important structure in a medical image, like an organ or cell. AI can help clinicians by highlighting pixels that may show signs of a certain disease or anomaly.
3- The rise of the chief AI officer: In the past five years, the number of companies with a designated head of AI position has nearly tripled globally. AI lead at recruiters Russell Reynolds Associates, has “seen the landscape shift” since the launch of ChatGPT.
4- TikTok may add AI avatars that can make ads: TikTok plans to add an AI creator feature to its platform. The new feature will let advertisers and TikTok Shop sellers generate scripts for a virtual influencer to read.
5- European car manufacturer will pilot Sanctuary AI’s humanoid robot: Sanctuary AI will be delivering its humanoid robot to a Magna manufacturing facility. Magna manufactures and assembles cars for a number of Europe’s top automakers, including Mercedes, Jaguar and BMW. Sanctuary calls the pilot, “a multi-disciplinary assessment of improving cost and scalability of robots using Magna’s automotive product portfolio.”
6- For Success with AI, Bring Everyone On Board: When it comes to using AI in the workplace, organizations must develop employee-inclusive AI practices. Those practices will make companies more likely to improve long-term performance—and to keep their employees happy, productive, and engaged.