Huawei Ascend 920, AI CloudMatrix, Goldman Sachs, Indosat, Doctronic, Netflix, Imagine RIT

The AI industry has seen significant developments, with Huawei unveiling its new Ascend 920 AI chip, a competitor to NVIDIA's H20, and its AI CloudMatrix cluster outperforming NVIDIA's GB200. Meanwhile, companies like Goldman Sachs and Indosat are leveraging AI tools to improve productivity and operations. AI is also being explored in various fields, including healthcare, with Doctronic raising $5 million for AI agents, and entertainment, with Netflix's CEO believing AI can make movies '10% better'. Additionally, the UAE is making progress in securing access to cutting-edge AI chips, and festivals like Imagine RIT are showcasing AI-powered exhibits to encourage public involvement in AI development.

Huawei Unveils Ascend 920 AI Chip

Huawei has launched its new Ascend 920 AI chip, a direct competitor to NVIDIA's H20. The chip uses SMIC's 6nm process and features 900 TFLOPS, a memory bandwidth of 4,000 GB/s, and a chiplet design. Huawei claims the Ascend 920 is 30-40% faster than its previous generation and could be superior to NVIDIA's H20. The launch comes after the US imposed export controls on NVIDIA, creating an opportunity for Huawei to fill the market gap.

Huawei's AI CloudMatrix Beats NVIDIA's GB200

Huawei's new AI CloudMatrix cluster has outperformed NVIDIA's GB200 by using brute force, with 4 times the power consumption. The system uses 384 Ascend 910C processors and delivers approximately 300 PFLOPs of dense BF16 compute, nearly two times the throughput of NVIDIA's GB200 NVL72. Although less power-efficient, the CloudMatrix 384 offers higher scale-up and scale-out bandwidth, making it a viable option for Chinese companies that cannot access NVIDIA's GB200 due to US export controls.

Goldman Sachs Employees Use AI Tools

Goldman Sachs has introduced AI-powered tools to help employees with their work, including a developer copilot, language translator, and an interactive AI assistant. The tools, built using the bank's AI platform, aim to improve productivity and efficiency. Seven employees shared their experiences with the AI tools, citing benefits such as time savings and improved accuracy. The bank plans to expand the tools to most employees by the end of the year.

Indosat Uses AI to Overhaul Operations

Indosat Ooredoo Hutchison, Indonesia's second-largest service provider, is using AI to transform its operations. The company has formed partnerships with NVIDIA, Accenture, and Nokia to realize its AI vision. Indosat's AI strategy is based on three pillars: becoming an AI-native telco, operating as an AI tech company, and leading as an AI nation shaper. The company has launched AI-RAN, a commercial AI-RAN infrastructure, and is investing in Indonesia's broader AI ecosystem.

Peter Singer's AI Chatbot

Peter Singer, a renowned philosopher, has created an AI chatbot to engage in discussions about ethics. The chatbot, called Peter Singer AI, aims to help people explore ethical questions and consider actions that can improve the well-being of all sentient beings. The chatbot is not sentient and lacks human experience, empathy, and context understanding, but can provide insights and pose questions to stimulate thinking. Singer believes that AI can be a useful tool for ethical reflection, but should be used as a complement to human judgment and conversation.

Doctronic Raises $5 Million for AI Agents

Doctronic, a healthcare AI startup, has raised $5 million in seed funding to develop AI agents that can provide personalized healthcare advice and connect patients with doctors. The company's platform uses a multi-agent framework, where different AI specialists handle different areas of medicine, and passes their work to a human clinician for validation. Doctronic aims to improve the healthcare system by streamlining the process and providing faster, more accurate responses to patients' questions.

Databricks Acquires Fennel AI

Databricks has acquired Fennel AI, a company that developed a modern, incremental compute engine for real-time feature engineering. The acquisition aims to strengthen Databricks' data intelligence platform and provide customers with more advanced data pipelines for batch, streaming, and real-time data. Fennel's platform offers a Python-native user experience and incremental computing technology, which helps optimize costs by avoiding redundant work.

UAE Sees Progress on AI Chips Access

The United Arab Emirates is optimistic about securing access to cutting-edge AI chips currently under US export restrictions, after pledging $1.4 trillion to strengthen ties with Washington. The country's leading AI firm, G42, believes that progress is being made in securing advanced semiconductors from the US.

Netflix CEO on AI in Movie Production

Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos believes that AI's true potential in Hollywood lies in making movies '10% better', rather than just cheaper. He cited the example of cinematographer Rodrigo Prieto, who used AI-powered tools to deliver de-aging VFX at a fraction of the cost of traditional methods. Sarandos aims to continue creating opportunities for AI to improve the creator experience, rather than replacing the role entirely.

Imagine RIT Features AI-Powered Exhibits

The Imagine RIT festival will feature various AI-powered exhibits, including a generative AI chatbot called Imagine RIT Bot, which can help visitors navigate the festival. Other exhibits include an AI-powered tutor called Tutor Bot, which helps people learn and study by digging deep into their foundational knowledge. The festival aims to showcase the potential of AI and encourage the public to get involved in its development.

Key Takeaways

Huawei has launched its new Ascend 920 AI chip, a direct competitor to NVIDIA's H20, with a 30-40% performance increase over its previous generation.
Huawei's AI CloudMatrix cluster has outperformed NVIDIA's GB200, despite being less power-efficient, by using brute force with 4 times the power consumption.
Goldman Sachs is using AI-powered tools to improve employee productivity, including a developer copilot, language translator, and interactive AI assistant.
Indosat is transforming its operations using AI, with partnerships with NVIDIA, Accenture, and Nokia, and has launched AI-RAN, a commercial AI-RAN infrastructure.
Peter Singer has created an AI chatbot to engage in discussions about ethics and stimulate thinking on ethical questions.
Doctronic has raised $5 million in seed funding to develop AI agents for personalized healthcare advice and connecting patients with doctors.
Databricks has acquired Fennel AI to strengthen its data intelligence platform and provide customers with advanced data pipelines.
The UAE is optimistic about securing access to cutting-edge AI chips currently under US export restrictions after pledging $1.4 trillion to strengthen ties with Washington.
Netflix's CEO believes AI can make movies '10% better' by improving the creator experience, rather than replacing the role entirely.
The Imagine RIT festival is featuring AI-powered exhibits, including a generative AI chatbot and an AI-powered tutor, to showcase the potential of AI and encourage public involvement in its development.