Korean tech giant Samsung has announced a major investment in artificial intelligence research in the UK.
The company is to open an AI research lab in Cambridge, in a move that has been welcomed by the prime minister.
The lab will join other Samsung centres dedicated to the topic, based in Moscow and Toronto. The technology is now seen as key to competing in many industries.
The UK has been a hotspot for AI research. But there are concerns about a growing skills shortage.
Samsung says the lab will focus on health and communication.
Theresa May said the announcement was “a vote of confidence in the UK as a world leader in artificial intelligence” and would create high-skilled highly paid jobs.
The new centre could recruit as many as 150 scientists – although Samsung is being quite vague about its precise plans.
It will be led by Prof Andrew Blake, an AI pioneer who previously ran Microsoft’s research lab in the same city.
The Bixby smart assistant is one example of Samsung’s deployment of AI. But there have been teething troubles with the technology, which has had a lower profile than Apple’s Siri or the Google Assistant.
Samsung intends to have AI technology on all its smart devices by 2020.
Source: BBC News
