The division, according to sources cited by The Korea Herald, is not yet fully operational but will be led by Shim Eun-soo, a former head of AI software research at the Samsung Advanced Institute of Technology. Samsung Electronics is now in the process of scouting for AI researchers with doctorates from universities including the University of Tokyo and the State University of New York, the report added.

The company’s bets in artificial intelligence continue. In November, Samsung announced plans to increase its efforts in AI and 5G to drive innovation across its business. During an AI forum held at the company’s R&D Center, Samsung’s head of IT and mobile communications, Koh Dong-jin, said: “In a hyperconnected society via 5G, AI and Internet of Things, a company that innovates user experiences will be a global business leader. 5G, AI will lay the ground for technology innovations for smartphones, wearables, speakers, Internet of Things, augmented reality and virtual reality, and provide a turning point for our everyday lives.”

In July, Samsung researchers successfully managed to develop an AI that generates realistic 3D renders of video scenes. The researchers, in a paper detailing the neural network behind AI, explained the inefficient process of creating virtual scenes in the modern day. Result of a 3D scene created by the AI showed that such a solution could one-day help game development, especially video game counterparts of movies that are already being filmed.

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As the world’s largest smartphone and memory chip manufacturer – along with being a key player in many consumer devices including TVs, washing machines, fridges, and more – Samsung has established itself as a tech leader.

The convergence of powerful emerging technologies such as AI, IoT, and the cloud, have the potential to radically shake-up the industry and dethrone established players if they don’t keep pace. Samsung has made clear it has no intention of giving up its castle.

“In a hyperconnected society via 5G, AI and internet of things, a company that innovates user experiences will be a global business leader,” said Koh Dong-jin, head of IT & mobile communications at Samsung, during an AI forum held at the company’s Seoul R&D Center.

“5G, AI will lay the ground for technology innovations for smartphones, wearables, speakers, internet of things, augmented reality and virtual reality, and provide a turning point for our everyday lives.”

Samsung has seven dedicated AI research centres across five nations; the US, UK, Korea, Canada, and Russia.

The company’s first AI mobile processor with a built-in 5G modem is set for release later this year to simplify the development of highly-capable devices with support for both of the important new technologies.

Amid a global slowdown in smartphone sales, Samsung will be hoping its AI and 5G investments help to fortify its position as a global tech leader in a rapidly-changing world.

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Three researchers at Samsung have created an AI which can generate realistic 3D renders of video scenes.

In a paper detailing the neural network behind the AI, the researchers explained the inefficient process of creating virtual scenes today:

“Creating virtual models of real scenes usually involves a lengthy pipeline of operations. Such modeling usually starts with a scanning process, where the photometric properties are captured using camera images and the raw scene geometry is captured using depth scanners or dense stereo matching.

The latter process usually provides noisy and incomplete point cloud that needs to be further processed by applying certain surface reconstruction and meshing approaches. Given the mesh, the texturing and material estimation processes determine the photometric properties of surface fragments and store them in the form of 2D parameterized maps, such as texture maps, bump maps, view-dependent textures, surface lightfields.

Finally, generating photorealistic views of the modeled scene involves computationally-heavy rendering process such as ray tracing and/or radiance transfer estimation.”

A video input is converted into points which represent the geometry of the scene. These geometry points are then rendered into computer graphics using a neural network, vastly speeding up the process of rendering a photorealistic 3D scene.

Here’s the result in a video of a 3D scene created by the AI:

Such a solution could one-day help game development, especially video game counterparts of movies that are already being filmed. Footage from a film set could provide a replica 3D environment for game developers to create interactive experiences in. Or, perhaps, you could relive events like your wedding day using just an old video and a VR headset.

Before such a point is reached, some advancements still need to be made. Current scenes cannot be altered and any large deviations from the original viewpoint results in artifacts. Still, it’s a fascinating early insight at what could be possible in a not-so-distant future.

You can read the full paper here or find the project’s Github page here.

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Around 30 AI experts are based at Samsung’s current Paris office working on research and development projects.

The Paris-based AI lab of Samsung is smaller than centres based in London, Toronto, and Montreal. While the lab itself is smaller than its counterparts elsewhere in the world, Samsung is seeking local partners to help advance its AI ambitions.

Sohn Young-kwon, Chief Strategy Officer of Samsung, is due to visit the Paris office in May to review its plans and meet local AI startups. These firms could be up for potential acquisition.

“Companies that could create synergies with Samsung’s AI lab are being identified for possible M&As,” local news outlet Maeil Business News reported.

Samsung has invested in 13 AI-related startups so far. Among the most notable is Viv Labs, founded by the creators of Siri.

Overall, the firm has invested more than $200 million in 75 startups through its various investment units.

Samsung has big plans for AI and recently announced it aims to have its entire range of electronic products fitted with AI by 2020.

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The company says its NPU (Neural Processing Unit) will deliver up to seven times faster AI performance than Samsung’s older Exynos 9810 chip in the S9.

Huawei became the first to debut a dedicated NPU in a flagship smartphone with their Kirin 970 chip in the Mate 10.

In our Mate 10 coverage, we noted Huawei claimed using an NPU could increase performance up to 25x over a CPU/GPU.

Huawei pitted the Mate 10 against the Galaxy Note 8 in an internal test recognising 100 photos. The Mate 10 reportedly completed the benchmark in five seconds while Samsung’s device trailed behind at 100 seconds.

Now that Samsung will have its own NPU chip, we look forward to comparing its performance against Huawei’s efforts.

Qualcomm chips are found in most other handsets – in fact, the Snapdragon 845 is even used in the US version of the Galaxy S9.

While Qualcomm is yet to launch a dedicated smartphone NPU, the company says the 845’s combination of DSP, CPU, and GPU delivers three times faster AI performance than its predecessor.

Samsung boasts the Exynos 9820 will deliver a 20 percent boost to single-core CPU performance and 15 percent improvement to multi-core. The GPU benefits from ARM’s new Mali G76 cores, which first debuted in Huawei’s Kirin 980 chip, to deliver 40 percent more performance.

The 9820 is said to be ready for production by the end of the year so it should be on track for the S10’s expected launch in late February.

It will be interesting to see how Samsung makes use of its NPU. More competition is always good, especially from a tech behemoth like Samsung, and will help drive innovations from the likes of Huawei and Apple further.

Here’s our video of Huawei’s latest AI features in the Mate 20 Pro:

 AI & >.

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Samsung’s New York AI centre will be led by Sebastian Seung, Executive Vice President of Samsung Research.

Each of Samsung’s AI centres focuses on different areas of research. The New York branch will be researching the important field of AI in robotics.

Hyun-suk Kim, President and Head of Samsung Research, said:

“What we need now is to focus on creating new values that make people’s lives easier and more convenient by harnessing the power of AI in Samsung’s products and services.

To do this, our Global AI Centers, including the New York AI Center, must play a pivotal role.”

Considering the use of Samsung’s technologies for industries such as manufacturing, AI-powered robotics will be an important part of the company’s future business. Expect plenty of Samsung’s resources to be allocated here to see off competition.

The latest AI centre opening is part of Samsung’s grand plan to employ ~1000 AI specialists by 2020.

Samsung has already opened AI centres in different locations around the world including Korea, the UK, France, Russia, Canada, and Silicon Valley.

Back in March, AI News reported of Samsung’s plans to open an AI centre in France.

“Great progress on artificial intelligence is happening in France,” President Macron said in a Twitter message. “Samsung chooses France to locate its new research centre on artificial intelligence, creating more than 100 jobs.”

However, some experts believe strict EU regulations will stunt the development of AI in Europe.

Our sister publication IoT News reported back in May about Samsung’s opening of a huge AI centre in the UK.

UK Prime Minister Theresa May commented:

“Samsung will create high-paying, high-skilled jobs and our modern industrial strategy will encourage further investment like this all around the country.

It is a vote of confidence in the UK as a world leader in artificial intelligence, and the new AI research centre will benefit from the world-renowned talent and academic prowess of Cambridge.”

The UK has become something of a hotbed for AI talent due to its leading universities and companies such as Google-acquired DeepMind. Significant funding has also been allocated for continued development, highlighting the importance of AI for the future economy.

Samsung’s UK centre is being led by Andrew Blake, an esteemed AI researcher and ex-director of Microsoft’s Cambridge Laboratory.

Blake comments: “Our research will help us to better understand human behaviour while exploring areas like emotion recognition, and further expand the boundaries of user-centric communication to develop AI technologies that ultimately improve people’s lives.”

All of Samsung’s AI centres around the globe will cooperate to advance the company’s goals to lead in the field.

“Samsung has a long history of pursuing innovation and we are excited to be bringing that same passion and technology leadership to AI,” said Hyun-suk Kim. “With the new AI centres and recruitment of leading experts in the field, our aim is to be a game-changer for the AI industry.”

What are your thoughts on Samsung’s new AI centres?

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