AI Weekly Digest – August 7 2023

Mentions of Artificial Intelligence soar in Big Tech results

Analysis revealed companies reporting Q2 results in recent weeks have dramatically increased the amount of times they are mentioning artificial intelligence in analyst calls, compared with the previous quarter. Reuters reported that AI was mentioned 58 times by Intel, up from 15 in its call three months earlier. During Google parent Alphabet's analyst call it was mentioned 62 times, up from 52. The mentions by Microsoft were 58 and 35, respectively.

News Corp Australia producing 3,000 articles a week via GenAI

News Corp Australia executive chair Michael Miller said it is producing 3,000 articles a week using generative artificial intelligence. He told the recent World News Media Congress in Taipei that a team of four in the Data Local team use the technology to generate thousands of weekly local stories . These reportedly focus on weather, fuel prices and traffic conditions.

A News Corp Australia?spokesperson said that despite 3,000 articles a week being created using generative artificial intelligence, they are still overseen by journalists . They said: “For some years now we have used automation to update local fuel prices several times daily as well as daily court lists, traffic and weather, death and funeral notices… I’d stress that all such information and decisions are overseen by working journalists from the Data Local team.” The team is headed up by data journalism editor Peter Judd, with many of its stories carrying his byline.?

WPP chief's 'exciting future plans in AI '

UK ad giant WPP's CEO Mark Read hailed "exciting future plans in AI that build on our acquisition of Satalia in 2021 and our use of AI across WPP ". He said: "We are leveraging our efforts with partnerships with the leading players including Adobe, Google, IBM, Microsoft, Nvidia and OpenAI. We are delivering work powered by AI for many clients including Nestlé, Nike and Mondelēz. AI will be fundamental to WPP's future success and we are committed to embracing it to drive long-term growth and value."

Meta 'set to launch AI-powered chatbots'

Meta is reportedly planning to launch a range of AI-powered chatbots that feature different personalities as soon as September, in a bid to increase engagement with the?Facebook and Instagram owner's platforms.

Early bet on AI chips pays off for semiconductor giants

An analyst told the FT that an early bet on AI memory chips by South Korea-based?SK Hynix and Samsung appears to have paid off as both saw shares rise despite reporting heavy operating losses. The chipmakers control 90% the worldwide market in high bandwidth memory chips, which are critical components in systems needed to train artificial intelligence systems. Macquarie's Daniel Kim said: “This is the first time that SK Hynix is ahead of Samsung in the memory technology race. SK Hynix bet on HBM chips early on and it worked out well.”

National World to use AI to ensure 'purely local content'

National World is planning to use AI to ensure “purely local content ” appears in its weekly newspapers, "thereby increasing value to the consumer and advertiser". The move was announced alongside a first-half financial update, in which the regional publisher said new titles it acquired in the first six months of the year are bringing in around ￡7m of extra revenue, while “a number of potential further acquisitions have also been identified”.

Reuters CEO: Confidence strengthens over AI opportunities

Thomson Reuters?CEO Steve Hasker said: "Importantly, our confidence around the opportunity that generative AI brings to us and our customers continues to strengthen." Asked whether Reuters will build, partner or buy AI capabilities, he said: "Our preference is to build. .. We have an aspiration to be significantly more innovative, meet and exceed our customers' expectations, and generative AI looks like a big opportunity to do that."?

Rakuten in OpenAI commercial tie-up

Japan-based Rakuten Group has signed a memorandum of understanding with ChatGPT creator OpenAI to explore commercial opportunities together.

Dell/Nvidia link-up to create generative AI solutions

Dell Technologies has launched new generative AI solutions in collaboration with chipmaker Nvidia. The latter makes the semiconductors behind OpenAI's ChatGPT. Dell said the tools, an expansion of its Project Helix initiative, will help businesses construct their own GenAI models.

Dell co-COO: 'Inflection point driving fundamental change

PC-maker Dell has entered the generative AI arena with, among other things, hardware to run powerful models and a managed service platform to help companies get started. Dell co-COO Jeff Clarke said: “Generative AI represents an inflection point that is driving fundamental change in the pace of innovation while improving the customer experience and enabling new ways to work."

Pinterest 'leveraging next-gen AI on our ad products'

After Pinterest Q2 revenue climbed 6% year-on-year to $708m, CEO Bill Ready said of the image-sharing platform: "We are also leveraging next-gen AI on our ad products and we're seeing a profound impact in our ad capabilities." he added.

Intel to 'build AI into every product that we build'

Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger said the chipmaker plans to “build AI into every product that we build" during the company’s Q2 earnings call.

NMA CEO: Trusted journalism vital in this new age

Commenting on the regional press review carried out by Enders Analysis,?News Media Association?CEO Owen Meredith said: “This report makes very clear the increasing importance of trusted local journalism to our society in the age of AI , and the efforts publishers are making to find a truly sustainable future for local news through innovation. The next five years will be critical for the sector and the report makes some helpful recommendations for interventions to support local journalism, such as government and the private sector making much greater use of the sector as an advertising platform.”

AI arms race: 'Wright Brothers-take-flight kind of stuff'

An FT article looking at how Silicon Valley is helping the Pentagon in the artificial intelligence arms race heard from Thomas Tull, a billionaire investor and chair of the US Innovative Technology Fund, who said: “The advancement [of AI] over the past six months has changed everything. This is ‘Wright Brothers-take-flight’ kind of stuff."

Lucrative role for Netflix machine learning specialist

Netflix is advertising a position for a machine learning product specialist with a salary between $300,000 and $900,000 a year. The Guardian noted that this comes amid strikes by US actors and writers over pay and protection from the encroachment of AI. It added that 87% of the guild’s actors earn less than $26,000 per year.

ChatGPT rolled out for Android in the UK

OpenAI said the ChatGPT for Android app is now available in the Google Play Store in the UK.