British chip designer ARM’s technology is at the heart of most mobile devices. Meanwhile, Nvidia’s GPUs are increasingly being used for AI computation in servers, desktops, and even things like self-driving vehicles.

However, Nvidia was most interested in ARM’s presence in edge devices—which it estimates to be in the region of 180 billion.

Jensen Huang, CEO of Nvidia, said:

“ARM is an incredible company and it employs some of the greatest engineering minds in the world. But we believe we can make ARM even more incredible and take it to even higher levels.

We want to propel it — and the UK — to global AI leadership.”

There were concerns Nvidia’s acquisition would lead to job losses, but the company has promised to keep the business in the UK. The company says it’s planning to hire more staff and retain ARM’s iconic brand.

Nvidia is going further in its commitment to the UK by opening a new AI centre in Cambridge, which is home to an increasing number of exciting startups in the field such as FiveAI, Prowler.io, Fetch.ai, and Darktrace.

“We will create an open centre of excellence in the area once home to giants like Isaac Newton and Alan Turing, for whom key NVIDIA technologies are named.

Here, leading scientists, engineers and researchers from the UK and around the world will come to develop their ideas, collaborate and conduct their ground-breaking work in areas like healthcare, life sciences, self-driving cars, and other fields.”

The new centre will have five key features when it opens:

• ARM/Nvidia-based supercomputer – set to be one of the most powerful AI supercomputers in the world.
• Research Fellowships and Partnerships – Nvidia will use the centre to establish new UK-based research partnerships, expanding on successful relationships already established with King’s College and Oxford.
• AI Training – Nvidia will make its AI curriculum available across the UK to help create job opportunities and prepare “the next generation of UK developers for AI leadership”
• Startup Accelerator – With so many of the world’s most exciting AI companies launching in the UK, the Nvidia Inception accelerator will help startups succeed by providing access to the aforementioned supercomputer, connections to researchers from NVIDIA and partners, technical training, and marketing promotion.
• Industry Collaboration – AI is still in its infancy but will impact every industry to some extent. Nvidia says its new research facility will be an open hub for industry collaboration, building on the company’s existing relationships with the likes of GSK, Oxford Nanopore, and other leaders in their fields.

The UK is Europe’s leader in AI and the British government is investing heavily in ensuring it maintains its pole position. Beyond funding, the UK is also aiming to ensure it’s among the best places to run an AI company.

Current EU rules, especially around data, are often seen as limiting the development of European AI companies when compared to elsewhere in the world. While the UK will have to avoid being accused of doing a so-called “bonfire of regulations” post-Brexit, data collection regulations is likely an area which will be relaxed.

In the UK’s historic trade deal signed with Japan last week, several enhancements were made over the blanket EU-Japan deal signed earlier this year. Among the perceived improvements is the “free flow of data” by not enforcing localisation requirements, and that algorithms can remain private.

UK trade secretary Liz Truss said: “The agreement we have negotiated – in record time and in challenging circumstances – goes far beyond the existing EU deal, as it secures new wins for British businesses in our great manufacturing, food and drink, and tech industries.”

Japan and the UK, as two global tech giants, are expected to deepen their collaboration in the coming years—building on the trade deal signed last week.

Shigeki Ishizuka, Chairman of the Japan Electronics and Information Technology Industries Association, said: “We are confident that this mutual relationship will be further strengthened as an ambitious agreement that will contribute to the promotion of cooperation in research and development, the promotion of innovation, and the further expansion of inter-company collaboration.”

Nvidia’s investment shows that it has confidence in the UK’s strong AI foundations continuing to gain momentum in the coming years.

(Photo by A Perry on Unsplash)

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Live-streaming poses a very modern but serious problem. As evident with the white supremacist attack in Christchurch in March, live-streams of terrorism can quickly go viral and taking down videos manually is often a slow process.

Automation can step-in to help identify and remove content to prevent terrorists from achieving the attention they seek. In order to teach its AI how to spot shootings, Facebook is teaming up with police in the UK.

Stephanie McCourt, Facebook’s Law Enforcement Outreach Lead (UK), said:

“Facebook’s work tackling threats from terrorism and extremism never stops. We invest heavily in people and technology to keep people safe on our platforms. But we can’t do it alone.

This partnership with the Met Police will help train our AI systems with the volume of data needed to identify these incidents. And we will remain committed to improving our detection abilities and keeping harmful content off Facebook.”

The police are providing first-person perspective videos from officers’ firearms training to Facebook. The clips will help the social media giant train its algorithms to detect shootings on live-streams.

Not only will early detection enable Facebook to more quickly remove terrorist videos, but it will also help to alert the police faster. The quicker a response can be deployed, the more lives can be potentially saved.

The police became involved with the project through the Counter-Terrorism Internet Referral Unit’s (CTIRU) long-standing relationship with Facebook.

Neil Basu, the UK’s top-ranking counter-terrorism officer, commented:

“As a result of the unit’s relationship with Facebook, coupled with the world-renowned expertise of the Met Police Firearms Command, the Met has been invited to take part in this innovative project.

The technology Facebook is seeking to create could help identify firearms attacks in their early stages and potentially assist police across the world in their response to such incidents.

Technology that automatically stops live streaming of attacks once identified, would also significantly help prevent the glorification of such acts and the promotion of the toxic ideologies that drive them.”

Officers from the world-renowned Firearms Command regularly train to respond to a wide variety of scenarios. These scenarios can include hostage situations carried out on land, water, public transport, and more.

Such a variety of footage will help Facebook train its AI to also recognise a large number of active shooter situations.

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A study commissioned by UK government advisory body the Centre for Data Ethics and Innovation warned that police felt AI may “amplify” prejudices.

50 experts were interviewed by the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) for the research, including senior police officers.

Racial profiling continues to be a huge problem. More young black men are stopped than young white men. The experts interviewed by the RUSI are worried these human prejudices could make their way into algorithms if they’re trained on existing police data.

It’s also noted how individuals from disadvantaged backgrounds tend to use more public transport. With data likely to be collected from the use of public transport, this increases the likelihood of those individuals being flagged.

The accuracy of facial recognition algorithms has often been questioned. Earlier this year, the Algorithmic Justice League tested all the major technologies and found that algorithms particularly struggled with darker-skinned females.

A similar report published by the American Civil Liberties Union focused on Amazon’s so-called Rekognition facial recognition system. When tested against members of congress, it incorrectly flagged those with darker skin more often.

Both findings show the potentially devastating societal impact if such technology was rolled out publicly today. It’s good to hear British authorities are at least aware of the potential complications.

The RUSI reports that experts in the study want to see clearer guidelines established for acceptable use of the technology. They hope this will provide confidence to police forces to adopt such potentially beneficial new technologies, but in a safe and responsible way.

“For many years police forces have looked to be innovative in their use of technology to protect the public and prevent harm and we continue to explore new approaches to achieve these aims,” Assistant Chief Constable Jonathan Drake told BBC News.

“But our values mean we police by consent, so anytime we use new technology we consult with interested parties to ensure any new tactics are fair, ethical and producing the best results for the public.”

You can find the full results of the RUSI’s study here.

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Dr Ling Ge, Chief European Representative at Tencent, said:

“The UK is a global leader in AI and is increasingly becoming a focus for companies looking to invest in the sector. PROWLER.io’s data-efficient approach and focus on human-machine teaming really set it apart.

We are looking forward to PROWLER.io applying its AI decision platform to a broadening range of customers, potentially including some of Tencent’s affiliate companies.”  

Prowler was founded in 2016 by engineers and mathematicians from Cambridge University. The startup aims to be an ‘AI platform for decision-making in a complex, dynamic, and uncertain world.’

Vishal Chatrath, CEO of Prowler.io, commented:

“Having initially focused on developing our AI platform, we are excited to be expanding our product offering into new verticals, underscoring the flexibility and innovative nature of our core technology.

We’re excited to be supporting global corporate and financial leaders like Mandatum Life, Pearson, RB Capital and Tencent with AI tools that enable people to make better decisions.”

Prowler.io launched its AI platform focusing on things such as managing supply chains and making decisions about financial portfolios. The company is now hoping to expand into new areas.

Lauri Vaittinen, SVP at Mandatum Life, a Prowler.io investor, added:

“Prowler.io is on its way to becoming a true enterprise AI platform — successfully expanding from its initial focus on financial services and logistics to apply its core AI technology to multiple adjacent market segments.

We are confident that the strategic partners, alongside the existing funding support, will help the company accelerate practical implementations – including hiring more engineering talent, operational managers, and reinforce the product development expertise.”

Founded in 2016, Prowler.io currently has 110 employees from 29 countries.

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