Close Menu
TechCentralTechCentral

    Subscribe to the newsletter

    Get the best South African technology news and analysis delivered to your e-mail inbox every morning.

    Facebook X (Twitter) YouTube LinkedIn
    WhatsApp Facebook X (Twitter) LinkedIn YouTube
    TechCentralTechCentral
    • News

      War of words erupts over home affairs database fee hike

      24 June 2025

      Don’t expect Starlink in South Africa anytime soon

      24 June 2025

      Finally! Tribunal unpacks why it blocked Vodacom’s Vumatel deal

      24 June 2025

      Samsung to unveil new folding phones at July event

      24 June 2025

      Capital Appreciation banks on payments to offset software slump

      24 June 2025
    • World

      Mira Murati’s Thinking Machines hits $10-billion valuation

      24 June 2025

      Watch | Starship rocket explodes in setback to Musk’s Mars mission

      19 June 2025

      Trump Mobile dials into politics, profit and patriarchy

      17 June 2025

      Samsung plots health data hub to link users and doctors in real time

      17 June 2025

      Beijing’s chip champions blacklisted by Taiwan

      16 June 2025
    • In-depth

      Meta bets $72-billion on AI – and investors love it

      17 June 2025

      MultiChoice may unbundle SuperSport from DStv

      12 June 2025

      Grok promised bias-free chat. Then came the edits

      2 June 2025

      Digital fortress: We go inside JB5, Teraco’s giant new AI-ready data centre

      30 May 2025

      Sam Altman and Jony Ive’s big bet to out-Apple Apple

      22 May 2025
    • TCS

      TechCentral Nexus S0E3: Behind Takealot’s revenue surge

      23 June 2025

      TCS | South Africa’s Sociable wants to make social media social again

      23 June 2025

      TCS+ | AfriGIS’s Helen Hulett on how tech can help resolve South Africa’s water crisis

      18 June 2025

      TechCentral Nexus S0E2: South Africa’s digital battlefield

      16 June 2025

      TechCentral Nexus S0E1: Starlink, BEE and a new leader at Vodacom

      8 June 2025
    • Opinion

      South Africa pioneered drone laws a decade ago – now it must catch up

      17 June 2025

      AI and the future of ICT distribution

      16 June 2025

      Singapore soared – why can’t we? Lessons South Africa refuses to learn

      13 June 2025

      South Africa risks being left behind as stablecoins reshape global finance

      6 June 2025

      Beyond the box: why IT distribution depends on real partnerships

      2 June 2025
    • Company Hubs
      • Africa Data Centres
      • AfriGIS
      • Altron Digital Business
      • Altron Document Solutions
      • Altron Group
      • Arctic Wolf
      • AvertITD
      • Braintree
      • CallMiner
      • CambriLearn
      • CYBER1 Solutions
      • Digicloud Africa
      • Digimune
      • Domains.co.za
      • ESET
      • Euphoria Telecom
      • Incredible Business
      • iONLINE
      • Iris Network Systems
      • LSD Open
      • NEC XON
      • Network Platforms
      • Next DLP
      • Ovations
      • Paracon
      • Paratus
      • Q-KON
      • SevenC
      • SkyWire
      • Solid8 Technologies
      • Telit Cinterion
      • Tenable
      • Vertiv
      • Videri Digital
      • Wipro
      • Workday
    • Sections
      • AI and machine learning
      • Banking
      • Broadcasting and Media
      • Cloud services
      • Contact centres and CX
      • Cryptocurrencies
      • Education and skills
      • Electronics and hardware
      • Energy and sustainability
      • Enterprise software
      • Fintech
      • Information security
      • Internet and connectivity
      • Internet of Things
      • Investment
      • IT services
      • Lifestyle
      • Motoring
      • Public sector
      • Retail and e-commerce
      • Science
      • SMEs and start-ups
      • Social media
      • Talent and leadership
      • Telecoms
    • Events
    • Advertise
    TechCentralTechCentral
    Home » World » Microsoft creates AI lab to take on Google

    Microsoft creates AI lab to take on Google

    By Agency Staff12 July 2017
    Twitter LinkedIn Facebook WhatsApp Email Telegram Copy Link
    News Alerts
    WhatsApp

    [dropcap]M[/dropcap]icrosoft is setting up a new research lab focused on artificial intelligence with the goal of creating more general-purpose learning systems.

    The new lab, called Microsoft Research AI, will be based at the company’s headquarters in Redmond, Washington in the US, and involve more than 100 scientists from across various sub-fields of artificial intelligence research, including perception, learning, reasoning and natural language processing.

    The goal, said Eric Horvitz, the director of Microsoft Research Labs, is to combine these disciplines to work toward more general artificial intelligence, meaning a single system that can tackle a wide range of tasks and problems. Such a system, for instance, might be able to both plan the best route to drive through a city and also figure out how to minimise your income tax bill, while also understanding difficult human concepts like sarcasm or gestures.

    The field has undergone a tremendous amount of centrifugal force over the years

    This differs from so-called narrow AIs, which are just designed to perform a single task well — for instance, recognise faces in digital photographs.

    In entering the race to develop more general learning systems, Microsoft will be competing with other AI research companies, such as London-based DeepMind and San Francisco-based Google Brain, both divisions of Alphabet, as well as OpenAI, whose founders include Elon Musk and Peter Thiel, and GoodAI, a small research outfit in the Czech Republic.

    “The field has undergone a tremendous amount of centrifugal force over the years,” Horvitz said in an interview, noting how computer vision experts rarely talked to natural language processing experts or vice versa. The goal of the new Microsoft lab, he said, was to bring all these researchers back together and get them talking to one another and working on common goals.

    Experts

    In addition to its existing researchers, Horvitz said Microsoft plans to hire computer scientists and experts in fields such as cognitive psychology to join the new lab. The new Microsoft lab will also partner with the Centre for Brains, Minds and Machines at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Horvitz said.

    Microsoft is partnering with many of its new rivals in an effort called the Partnership on AI to Benefit People and Society that is looking at the ethical implications of the development of more powerful and increasingly ubiquitous machine-learning systems.

    Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella

    Horvitz, who was the co-founding chair of the Partnership on AI and will take over as sole chair next year, said that as Microsoft developed more advanced AI capabilities, it was critical that these systems were perceived as both fair and transparent.

    To that end, Microsoft also said on Wednesday it was creating a new company-wide advisory panel, consisting of representatives from each of its corporate divisions and also chaired by Horvitz, to provide ethical oversight for the company’s AI efforts. The panel, called AI and Ethics in Engineering and Research, or Aether for short, will report directly to Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella.

    The new initiatives on AI research come at a time when AI-enabled products — such as its voice-activated digital assistant Cortana — are becoming more critical to Microsoft. Last week, the company reorganised its sales force to focus more on selling products related to artificial intelligence and cloud computing.  — Reported by Jeremy Kahn, (c) 2017 Bloomberg LP



    Eric Horvitz Google Microsoft Satya Nadella
    Subscribe to TechCentral Subscribe to TechCentral
    Share. Facebook Twitter LinkedIn WhatsApp Telegram Email Copy Link
    Previous ArticleSA’s house is burning, Ramaphosa says
    Next Article Cryptocurrencies hit a serious speed wobble

    Related Posts

    Siemens is battling Big Tech for AI supremacy in factories

    24 June 2025

    Apple shifts its AI strategy

    23 June 2025

    Stolen phone? Samsung now buys you an hour to lock it down

    18 June 2025
    Company News

    Communication costs exploding? Telviva has a fix for UK-SA teams

    24 June 2025

    Section 18A deductions and BEE points – a strategic choice for business compliance in 2025

    24 June 2025

    Huawei Watch Fit 4 Series: beauty, brains and a battery that won’t quit

    24 June 2025
    Opinion

    South Africa pioneered drone laws a decade ago – now it must catch up

    17 June 2025

    AI and the future of ICT distribution

    16 June 2025

    Singapore soared – why can’t we? Lessons South Africa refuses to learn

    13 June 2025

    Subscribe to Updates

    Get the best South African technology news and analysis delivered to your e-mail inbox every morning.

    © 2009 - 2025 NewsCentral Media

    Type above and press Enter to search. Press Esc to cancel.