Apple joins rivals to advance AI research

Apple joins the Partnership on AI. Agam Shah reports

Apple has joined rivals Google, IBM, Microsoft, Facebook and Amazon as it takes a step ahead to advance research and development of artificial intelligence. The Partnership on AI was founded in September 2016 to steer debate on best practices on AI. The group believes the technology could help in areas such as healthcare and transport.

Siri is currently Apple’s most visible artificial intelligence technology but a larger strategy is still a subject of speculation. The firm will likely implement the technology in its mysterious autonomous car project, so self-driving vehicles can navigate and cruise the roads safely without a human at the wheel.

Beyond the Alexa voice assistant, Amazon uses AI to provide buying recommendations. Google recently said it was providing TensorFlow tools, so users can build a wide variety of AI capabilities into Raspberry Pi 3 and IBM’s high-powered cognitive computers.

The group believes artificial intelligence holds tremendous promise and will lead to a big societal impact. The technology’s impact needs to be discussed, and companies need to establish ground rules on how the technology is developed and deployed, according to the group.