Toyota Invests $1 Billion in Artificial Intelligence in U.S.

by John Markoff and Steve Lohr,  The New York Times

Silicon Valley is diving into artificial intelligence technology, with start-ups sprouting up and Google and Facebook pouring vast sums into projects that would teach machines how to learn and make decisions.

Now Toyota wants a piece of the action.Toyota on Friday announced a five-year, $1-billion investment to establish an artificial intelligence (AI) research laboratory in Silicon Valley called the Toyota Research Institute (TRI).  Conceived as a research facility bridging basic science and commercial engineering, it will be organized as a new company to be named Toyota Research Institute. Toyota will initially have a laboratory adjacent to Stanford University and another near M.I.T. in Cambridge, Mass.

The facility will initially concentrate on AI and robotics, investigating how humans move both indoors and outdoors so such knowledge can be applied to mobility for an aging population. The center also will prioritize technologies intended to improve driving safety, as opposed to a complete transition to driverless cars.

Toyota’s research focus reflects a rush to develop AI products and services thanks to the advent of successful offerings after years of stagnant development by labs in this sector. Also observed in recent years is a race to acquire talented machine-learning scientists, 200 of whom Toyota plans to hire for the new AI lab. “The density of people doing this kind of work in Silicon Valley is higher than any other place in the world,” says the lab’s director and former U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency official Gill Pratt.

He also says Toyota plans to incorporate AI technologies and data into its factory automation systems. “There may also be advances in robot perception, planning, collaboration, and electromechanical design from TRI that will translate into improvements in manufacturing robotics,” Pratt notes.  Read the article.