Job Search 2020: AI Is the New Gatekeeper to Your Dream Career – Observer

Posted on January 25, 2020 by admin

Many companies have turned to artificial intelligence to lead job candidacy searches and cherry pick job applicants Welcome to the Wild West of Hiring. Pixabay

The new job search question to ask yourself: What if AI doesnt like me?

This is the obstacle now faced by college graduates hoping to land their first dream job. Yes, the human resources departments at companies are steering further away from humans and embracing artificial intelligence in their job candidacy searches.

SEE ALSO: Can Artificial Intelligence Determine If You Have a Toxic Workplace?

So now, job seekers, its all about winning the algorithm game.

According to CNN, career counselors at bigwig schools, such as Duke University, Purdue University and the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, are priming students on what companies use AIand how to outfox the algorithms.

Gone are such job interview preparations as mentioned in thisold-timey video from the archaic days of 2010.

Companies looking to fill internships and entry-level positions aresteering more toward using platforms, such as HireVue, to help conduct a vast number of interviews via video that are analyzed by AI.HireVue, whose headquarters is in Salt Lake City, is used by over 800 companies including CNN, Hilton and Unilever. (Thats up from 50 companies in 2018.)

CEO Kevin Parker told The Wall Street Journalthat the companys platform removes human biases from the job interview process. And he said that like its a good thing.

And this is becoming the new norm, in terms of job interview preparation: how to make a good job interview video.

Well interview probably a million college kids this year, Parker told CNN.

You can see the appeal for a company to use the HireVue platform. The candidates simply answer a set of predetermined questions via their laptop or smartphone camera. And then, the videos are run through the algorithm ringernoting such details as facial expressions (captured by facial analysis software), voice tonality, word usage and grammar. (Sorry, foreign job candidates and those with botox.)

The applicants performance is then compared to actual company employees and then a score is given. The analysis is said to determine which candidates would make a good team member (who also happen to have good facial expressions and voice tonality).

The job applicant rejects, on the other hand, will have their videos posted immediately on YouTube for the world to mock. (This part isnt true, I repeat, not truebut you never know what the future holds.)

Do you foresee any problems with AI breaking down job candidates into a series of ones and zeros? Gone from this equation is personal interactions, a sense of soul and actually looking someone directly in the eye.

Now that companies are turning to AI to be the job hiring gatekeeper, does artificial intelligence have the capacity to determine humor, irony and, in general, the heart and kindness of a person? The same type of questions were asked when we dove into whether or not artificial intelligence could determine if you have a toxic workplace.

Heres more on the nuts and bolts of how AI cherry picks job applicants, which has been called the Wild West of hiring.

So not only do we have to worry about robots stealing our jobs, but we also have to worry about a machine not hiring us.

Whats next in our present job quest dystopia? Will job applicants also have to take the VK test from Blade Runner?

HireVue believes its platform can be helpful for ushering a massive number of people through the interview process quickly and reviewing them in a fair, consistent way. The big fear is that AI has the potential to replace humans doing the same job. (In this case, its humans doing human resource manager jobs.) In the medical field, using AI makes sense for things, such as scanning for breast cancer. Its becoming a tool to assist real-life doctors by giving an analytical second opinion. Therefore, it complements the professionand saves lives.

But in this case, in which AI is the job gatekeeper, it simply allows companies to throw as many plates of job seeker spaghetti against the wall with no added effort. All it really does is waste the time of the optimistic job applicants. No time is wasted by the company to allow a million job seeking monkeys to send out a million job seeking application videosin hopes that one algorithm will produce the entire works of Shakespeareand be hired.

Basically, these entry-level, intern-seeking graduates are the guinea pigs for an AI-produced workforce of tomorrow. What flaws will we find in this system and what future lawsuits will arise?

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Job Search 2020: AI Is the New Gatekeeper to Your Dream Career - Observer

Human beings are unable to connect with artificial intelligence: Pranav Mistry – ETtech.com

Posted on January 25, 2020 by admin

Neon, the artificial human prototype conceptualized by computer scientist and inventor Pranav Mistry, created waves recently. The President and CEO of Samsung's STAR Labs told ET in an exclusive interview that he created Neon because human beings are unable to connect with artificial intelligence (AI) assistants such as Apples Siri.

The Palanpur (Gujarat)-born Mistry, considered one of the best innovative minds in the world right now, said Neon will be a companion to the elderly and to those who are lonely and could even work as fashion models or news anchors. The 38-year-old also spoke about the dangers posed by AI,echoing Google parent Alphabet Incs chief Sundar Pichai who recently called upon governments to regulate AI. Edited Excerpts:

When you started thinking about Neon, what was the problem you were trying to solve?

Two years ago, when we started thinking about it (we wanted to) push the boundaries of science so that can the machine interfaces become just like humans. It solves a lot of problems and opens up a lot of opportunities that never existed before. A lot of businesses are coming to us (for Neon), from media companies, film and even the fashion industry.

Say, for example, if ICICI Bank has domain-specific knowledge, (and) they need to talk to customers in a particular way (then) think about a powerful front-end interface that can connect to any third-party services for B2B applications. When it comes to consumer applications, in the long run, we need to build something that doesn't exist someone who can have the human aspects, emotions...

As a science, this thing never existed. Tomorrow, it might solve healthcare problems, or education problems or the loneliness problem in the United Kingdom.

Initially, what could Neon be used for?

I was talking to the chairman of a big media company in (South) Korea. They say the major problem is breaking news at night since you need to wake up the whole crew. We're not here to replace the main news anchor, but how about (if) your favourite news anchor is on your phone and tells you hey, you missed yesterday's game. This is what happened. That personal connection is more important.

As a kid, I grew up with Mickey Mouse. These cartoon characters are not just in our movies, they are in our dreams. My daughter is sad when Princess Fiona is sad; the human connection is what keeps us attached as a human. And, that is the reason behind doing this.

So, it's like a face to AI assistants like Alexa or Siri?

Yes, AI doesnt have a face right now.No technology has that interface. Even when our soldiers are in the field, somebody needs to talk to them. Are they mentally healthy? You can put a questionnaire to them --On a scale of 0-6 how are you feeling?. Thats not the right interface in that situation. If someone could only to talk to them...

An old person...has an AI system to give him all the answers at his home, but what he is looking for is someone to talk to. Because, that's where the loneliness problem is coming in. If you notice all these problems of loneliness or autism...they are coming from countries that already have everything -- every single piece of technology -- they can watch any movie, but they still feel lonely... because current technology is not solving that problem. Because there is no human face to the technology... and that is why I am doing this. Star Labs is an independent future factory. No one decides what Star Labs does. It is fully backed by Samsung, but Samsung does not ask a single question.

Theoretical physicist and cosmologist, the late Stephen Hawking, had said that AI could be dangerous. Others, too, have echoed those thoughts. Are you concerned about what you are building?

Every technology, if you take even the smallest neon bulb right now, can be misused.Nuclear fusion is a threat to the world right now, but this is the same nuclear fusion that drives more than 50% of the worlds electricity. AI has its own problems, but why I feel even more comfortable about this is because if I don't do this thing right now, in two years time someone else will be talking about it...

I feel comfortable because...I understand what the ethical standards of this thing should be, because I am imagining and dreaming a better world, not just a richer world for a few. So many of my products, ideas like Sixth Sense were open source; when I did Galaxy Gear, it was nothing to do with money.

What are the checks and balances an AI ecosystem needs to have?

This phase of AI the understanding of it in the scientific world, technology world as well as the consumer world is very different. Core people who are actually behind this know where this technologys expertise ends. They know that AI has nothing to do with intelligence.

AI is a smart database system. If you do not show a machine 1,000 pictures of an elephant, it cannot recognise it. It doesnt even know what an elephant is. The limitations of the current approaches to AI end there, because nature doesnt work this way. My daughter can see a vague drawing and tell you that its an elephant, but an AI machine will not do the same because the approach is not the same.

But, we still need the tabs, both as a consumer community as well as the scientific and technology community. We need to put the boundaries of architecture on the design level, like science fiction movies, like in any robotics movie there used to be the three rules of robotics, such as robots will not hurt humans etc. Why this is important is because anything has potential to explode or to make the world better.

So, who puts in those rules?Thats what the world needs to decide -- the core thinkers of the world. And thats why I feel, if I dont do it (build Neon), someone else will do it. Thats why I feel much safer that what is going to go will go past me. I would love to have that conversation, not at the government level but at the community level that, can we ensure there are rules and everybody follows them.

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Human beings are unable to connect with artificial intelligence: Pranav Mistry - ETtech.com

Artificial intelligence to update digital maps and improve GPS navigation – Inceptive Mind

Posted on January 25, 2020 by admin

While Google and other technology giants have their own dynamics to keep the most detailed and up-to-date maps possible, it is an expensive and time-consuming process. And in some areas, the data is limited.

To improve this, researchers at MIT and Qatar Computing Research Institute (QCRI) have developed a new machine-learning model based on satellite images that could significantly improve digital maps for GPS navigation. The system, called RoadTagger, recognizes the types of roads and the number of lanes in satellite images, even in spite of trees or buildings that obscure the view. In the future, the system should recognize even more details, such as bike paths and parking spaces.

RoadTagger relies on a novel combination of a convolutional neural network (CNN) and a graph neural network (GNN) to automatically predict the number of lanes and road types (residential or highway) behind obstructions.

Simply put, this model is fed only raw data and automatically produces output without human intervention. Following this dynamic, you can predict, for example, the type of road or if there are several lanes behind a grove, according to the analyzed characteristics of the satellite images.

The researcher team has already tested RoadTagger using real data, covering an area of 688 square kilometers of maps of 20 U.S. cities, and achieved 93% accuracy in the detection of road types and 77% in the number of lanes.

Maintaining this degree of accuracy on digital maps would not only save time and avoid many headaches for drivers but could also prevent accidents. And of course, it would be vital information in case of emergency or disasters.

The researchers now want to further improve the system and also record additional properties, including bike paths, parking bays, and the road surface after all, it makes a difference for drivers whether a former gravel track is now paved somewhere in the hinterland.

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Artificial intelligence to update digital maps and improve GPS navigation - Inceptive Mind

What Is Quantum Computing, And How Can It Unlock Value For Businesses? – Computer Business Review

Posted on January 25, 2020 by admin

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We are at an inflection point

Ever since Professor Alan Turing proposed the principle of the modern computer in 1936, computing has come a long way. While advancements to date have been promising, the future is even brighter, all thanks to quantum computing, which performs calculations based on the behaviour of particles at the sub-atomic level, writes Kalyan Kumar, CVP and CTO IT Services,HCL Technologies.

Quantum computing promises to unleash unimaginable computing power thats not only capable of addressing current computational limits, but unearthing new solutions to unsolved scientific and social mysteries. Whats more, thanks to increasing advancement since the 1980s, quantum computing can now drive some incredible social and business transformations.

Quantum computing holds immense promise in defining a positive, inclusive and human centric future, which is what theWEF Future Council on Quantum Computingenvisages. The most anticipated uses of quantum computing are driven by its potential to simulate quantum structures and behaviours across chemicals and materials. This promise is being seen guardedly by current scientists who claim quantum computing is still far from making a meaningful impact.

This said, quantum computing is expected to open amazing and much-needed possibilities in medical research. Drug development time, which usually takes more than 10 to 12 years with billions of dollars of investment, is expected to reduce considerably, alongside the potential to explore unique chemical compositions that may just be beyond the limits of current classical computing. Quantum computing can also help with more accurate weather forecasting, and provide accurate information that can help save tremendous amounts of agriculture production from damage.

Quantum computing promises a better and improved future, and while humans are poised to benefit greatly from this revolution, businesses too can expect unapparelled value.

When it comes to quantum computing, it can be said that much of the world is at the they dont know what they dont know stage. Proof points are appearing, and it is seemingly becoming clear that quantum computing solves problems that cannot be addressed by todays computers. Within transportation, for example, quantum computing is being used to develop battery and self-driving technologies, while Volkswagen has also been using quantum computing to match patterns and predict traffic conditions in advance, ensuring a smoother movement of traffic. In supply chains, logistics and trading are receiving a significant boost from the greater computing power and high-resolution modelling quantum computing provides, adding a huge amount of intelligence using new approaches to machine learning.

The possibilities for businesses are immense and go way beyond these examples mentioned above, in domains such as healthcare, financial services and IT. Yet a new approach is required. The companies that succeed in quantum computing will be those that create value chains to exploit the new insights, and form a management system to match the high-resolution view of the business that will emerge.

While there are some initial stage quantum devices already available, these are still far from what the world has been envisaging. Top multinational technology companies have been investing considerably in this field, but they still have some way to go. There has recently been talk of prototype quantum computers performing computations that would have previously taken 10,000 years in just 200 seconds. Though of course impressive, this is just one of the many steps needed to achieve the highest success in quantum computing.

It is vital to understand how and when we are going to adopt quantum computing, so we know the right time to act. The aforementioned prototype should be a wakeup call to early adopters who are seeking to find ways to create a durable competitive advantage. We even recently saw a business announcing its plans to make a prototype quantum computer available on its cloud, something we will all be able to buy or access some time from now. If organisations truly understand the value and applications of quantum computing, they will be able to create new products and services that nobody else has. However, productising and embedding quantum computing into products may take a little more time.

One important question arises from all this: are we witnessing the beginning of the end for classical computing? When looking at the facts, it seems not. With the advent of complete and practical quantum computers, were seeing a hybrid computing model emerging where digital binary computers will co-process and co-exist with quantum Qbit computers. The processing and resource sharing needs are expected to be optimised using real time analysis, where quantum takes over exponential computational tasks. To say the least, quantum computing is not about replacing digital computing, but about coexistence enabling composed computing that handles different tasks at the same time similar to humans having left and right brains for analytical and artistic dominance.

If one things for sure, its that we are at an inflection point, witnessing what could arguably be one of the most disruptive changes in human existence. Having a systematic and planned approach to adoption of quantum computing will not only take some of its mystery away, but reveal its true strategic value, helping us to know when and how to become part of this once in a lifetime revolution.

Healthcare venture investment in 2020: Quantum computing gets a closer look – Healthcare IT News

Posted on January 25, 2020 by admin

Among the healthcare technologies venture firms be looking at most closely at in 2020, various artificial intelligence and machine learning applications are atop this list, of course. But so are more nuts-and-bolts tools like administrative process automation and patient engagement platforms, VCs say.

Other, more leading-edge technologies genomics-focused data and analytics, and even quantum computing are among the areas attracting investor interest this year.

"We expect 2020 to mark the first year where health IT venture firms will start to look at quantum computing technology for upcoming solutions," Dr. Anis Uzzaman, CEO and general partner of Pegasus Tech Ventures, told Healthcare IT News.

"With the breakthrough supremacy announcement from Google validating the technology and the subsequent launch of the service Amazon Braket in 2019, there is sure to be a new wave of entrepreneurial activity starting in 2020."

He said quantum computing technology holds a lot of promise for the healthcare industry with potential breakthroughs possible throughout the health IT stack from operations and administration to security.

Among the promising companies, Uzzaman pointed to Palo Alto-based QC Ware, a startup pioneering a software solution that enables companies to use a variety of quantum hardware platforms such as Rigetti and IBM to solve a variety of enterprise problems, including those specifically related to healthcare.

He also predicted artificial intelligence would continue to be at the forefront for health IT venture firms in 2020 as it becomes more clear which startups may be winners in their initial target sectors.

"There has been consistent growth of investment activity over the past few years into healthcare startups using artificial intelligence to target a range of areas from imaging to diagnostics," he said.

However, Uzzaman also noted regulation and long enterprise sales cycles have largely slowed the ability for these companies to significantly scale their revenues.

"Therefore, we anticipate 2020 will be the year where it will become clearer to health IT venture firms who will be winners in applying artificial intelligence to imaging, pathology, genomics, operations, diagnostics, transcription, and more," he said. "We will also continue to see moderate growth in the overall investment amount in machine learning and AI companies, but will see a notable decrease in the number of companies receiving an investment.

Uzzaman explained there were already some signs in late 2019 that there could be late in a short-term innovation cycle for artificial intelligence with many companies, particularly those applying machine learning and AI to robotics, shutting down.

"However, we anticipate many companies will reach greater scale with their solutions and separate themselves from the competition, which will translate into more mega funding rounds," he said.

Ezra Mehlman, managing partner with Health Enterprise Partners, explained that at the beginning of each year, the firm conducts a market mapping exercise to determine which healthcare IT categories are rising to the top of the prioritization queue of its network of hospital and health plan limited partners.

"In the past year, we have seen budgets meaningfully open for automation solutions in administrative processing, genomics-focused data and analytics offerings, aging-in-place technologies and, in particular, patient engagement platforms rooted in proven clinical use cases," he said. "We are actively looking at all of these spaces."

He pointed out that in 2018, more than $2 billion was invested into artificial intelligence and machine learning healthcare IT companies, which represented a quarter of the total dollars invested into digital health companies that year.

"We view this as a recognition of two things: the meteoric aspirations that the market has assigned to AI and machine learning's potential, and a general sense that the underlying healthcare data infrastructure has reached the point of maturity, where it is possible to realize ROI from AI/machine learning initiatives," he said.

However, he said Health Enterprise Partners is still waiting for the "breakout" to occur in adoption.

"We believe we have now reached the point where category leaders will emerge in each major healthcare AI subsector and the usage will become more widespread we have made one such investment in the clinical AI space in the last year," Mehlman said.

Heading into 2020, Mehlman said companies that cannot deliver high-six-figure, year-one ROI in the form of increased revenue or reduced cost will struggle, and companies that cannot crisply answer the question, "Who is the buyer and what is the budget?" will be challenged.

"If one applies these tests to some of the areas that have attracted the most healthcare VC investment--social determinants of health, blockchain and digital therapeutics to name a few the number of viable companies sharply drops off," he said.

Mehlman noted that while these sound like simple principles, the current environment of rapidly consolidating, budget-constrained hospitals, vertically integrating health plans, and big tech companies making inroads into healthcare has raised the bar on what is required for a healthcare startup to gain meaningful market traction.

Delta Partners with IBM to Explore Quantum Computing – Database Trends and Applications

Posted on January 25, 2020 by admin

Delta Air Lines is embarking on a multi-year collaborative effort with IBM including joining theIBM Q Networkto explore the potential capabilities of quantum computing to transform experiences for customers and employees.

"Partnering with innovative companies like IBM is one way Delta stays on the leading edge of tech to better serve our customers and our people, while drawing the blueprints for application across our industry," saidRahul Samant, Delta's CIO. "We've done this most recently with biometrics in our international terminals and we're excited to explore how quantum computing can be applied to address challenges across the day of travel."

TheIBM Q Network is a global community of Fortune 500 companies, startups, academic institutions and research labs working to advance quantum computing and explore practical applications.

Additionally, through theIBM Q Hub at NC State University, Delta will have access to the IBM Q Network's fleet of universal hardware quantum computersfor commercial use cases and fundamental research, including the recently-announced 53-qubit quantum computer, which, the company says, has the most qubits of a universal quantum computer available for external access in the industry, to date.

"We are very excited by the addition of Delta to our list of collaborators working with us on building practical quantum computing applications," said director of IBM ResearchDario Gil. "IBM's focus, since we put the very first quantum computer on the cloud in 2016, has been to move quantum computing beyond isolated lab experiments conducted by a handful of organizations, into the hands of tens of thousands of users. We believe a clear advantage will be awarded to early adopters in the era of quantum computing and with partners like Delta, we're already making significant progress on that mission."

For more information about the IBM Q Network, go to http://www.ibm.com/quantum-computing/network/overview

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ASC20 Finals to be Held in Shenzhen, Tasks Include Quantum Computing Simulation and AI Language Exam – HPCwire

Posted on January 25, 2020 by admin

BEIJING, Jan. 21, 2020 The 2020 ASC Student Supercomputer Challenge (ASC20) announced the tasks for the new season: using supercomputers to simulate Quantum circuit and training AI models to take English test. These tasks can be unprecedented challenges for the 300+ ASC teams from around the world. From April 25 to 29, 2020, top 20 finalists will fiercely compete at SUSTech in Shenzhen, China.

ASC20 set up Quantum Computing tasks for the first time. Teams are going to use the QuEST (Quantum Exact Simulation Toolkit) running on supercomputers to simulate 30 qubits in two cases: quantum random circuits (random.c), and quantum fast Fourier transform circuits (GHZ_QFT.c). Quantum computing is a disruptive technology, considered to be the next generation high performance computing. However the R&D of quantum computers is lagging behind due to the unique properties of quantum. It adds extra difficulties for scientists to use real quantum computers to solve some of the most pressing problems such as particle physics modeling, cryptography, genetic engineering, and quantum machine learning. From this perspective, the quantum computing task presented in the ASC20 challenge, hopefully, will inspire new algorithms and architectures in this field.

The other task revealed is Language Exam Challenge. Teams will take on the challenge to train AI models on an English Cloze Test dataset, vying to achieve the highest test scores. The dataset covers multiple levels of English language tests in China, including the college entrance examination, College English Test Band 4 and Band 6, and others. Teaching the machines to understand human language is one of the most elusive and long-standing challenges in the field of AI. The ASC20 AI task signifies such a challenge, by using human-oriented problems to evaluate the performance of neural networks.

Wang Endong, ASC Challenge initiator, member of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and Chief Scientist at Inspur Group, said that through these tasks, students from all over the world get to access and learn the most cutting-edge computing technologies. ASC strives to foster supercomputing & AI talents of global vision, inspiring technical innovation.

Dr. Lu Chun, Vice President of SUSTech host of the ASC20 Finals, commented that supercomputers are important infrastructure for scientific innovation and economic development. SUSTech makes focused efforts on developing supercomputing and hosting ASC20, hoping to drive the training of supercomputing talent, international exchange and cooperation, as well as inter discipline development at SUSTech.

Furthermore, during January 15-16, 2020, the ASC20 organizing committee held a competition training camp in Beijing to help student teams prepare for the ongoing competition. HPC and AI experts from the State Key Laboratory of High-end Server and Storage Technology, Inspur, Intel, NVIDIA, Mellanox, Peng Cheng Laboratory and the Institute of Acoustics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences gathered to provide on-site coaching and guidance. Previous ASC winning teams also shared their successful experiences.

About ASC

The ASC Student Supercomputer Challenge is the worlds largest student supercomputer competition, sponsored and organized by Asia Supercomputer Community in China and supported by Asian, European, and American experts and institutions. The main objectives of ASC are to encourage exchange and training of young supercomputing talent from different countries, improve supercomputing applications and R&D capacity, boost the development of supercomputing, and promote technical and industrial innovation. The annual ASC Supercomputer Challenge was first held in 2012 and has since attracted over 8,500 undergraduates from all over the world. Learn more ASC athttps://www.asc-events.org/.

Source: ASC

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ASC20 Finals to be Held in Shenzhen, Tasks Include Quantum Computing Simulation and AI Language Exam - HPCwire

New Centers Lead the Way towards a Quantum Future – Energy.gov

Posted on January 25, 2020 by admin

The world of quantum is the world of the very, very small. At sizes near those of atoms and smaller, the rules of physics start morphing into something unrecognizableat least to us in the regular world. While quantum physics seems bizarre, it offers huge opportunities.

Quantum physics may hold the key to vast technological improvements in computing, sensing, and communication. Quantum computing may be able to solve problems in minutes that would take lifetimes on todays computers. Quantum sensors could act as extremely high-powered antennas for the military. Quantum communication systems could be nearly unhackable. But we dont have the knowledge or capacity to take advantage of these benefitsyet.

The Department of Energy (DOE) recently announced that it will establish Quantum Information Science Centers to help lay the foundation for these technologies. As Congress put forth in the National Quantum Initiative Act, the DOEs Office of Science will make awards for at least two and up to five centers.

These centers will draw on both quantum physics and information theory to give us a soup-to-nuts understanding of quantum systems. Teams of researchers from universities, DOE national laboratories, and private companies will run them. Their expertise in quantum theory, technology development, and engineering will help each center undertake major, cross-cutting challenges. The centers work will range from discovery research up to developing prototypes. Theyll also address a number of different technical areas. Each center must tackle at least two of these subjects: quantum communication, quantum computing and emulation, quantum devices and sensors, materials and chemistry for quantum systems, and quantum foundries for synthesis, fabrication, and integration.

The impacts wont stop at the centers themselves. Each center will have a plan in place to transfer technologies to industry or other research partners. Theyll also work to leverage DOEs existing facilities and collaborate with non-DOE projects.

As the nations largest supporter of basic research in the physical sciences, the Office of Science is thrilled to head this initiative. Although quantum physics depends on the behavior of very small things, the Quantum Information Science Centers will be a very big deal.

The Office of Science is the single largest supporter of basic research in the physical sciences in the United States and is working to address some of the most pressing challenges of our time. For more information, please visit https://www.energy.gov/science.

IBM And University Of Tokyo Launch Quantum Computing Initiative For Japan – E3zine.com

Posted on January 25, 2020 by admin

IBM and the University of Tokyo announced an agreement to partner to advance quantum computing and make it practical for the benefit of industry, science and society.

IBM and theUniversity of Tokyowill form theJapan IBM Quantum Partnership, a broad national partnership framework in which other universities, industry, and government can engage. The partnership will have three tracks of engagement: one focused on the development of quantum applications with industry; another on quantum computing system technology development; and the third focused on advancing the state of quantum science and education.

Under the agreement, anIBM Q System One, owned and operated by IBM, willbe installed in an IBM facility inJapan. It will be the first installation of its kind in the region and only the third in the world followingthe United StatesandGermany. The Q System One will be used to advance research in quantum algorithms, applications and software, with the goal of developing the first practical applications of quantum computing.

IBM and theUniversity of Tokyowill also create a first-of-a-kind quantumsystem technology center for the development of hardware components and technologies that will be used in next generation quantum computers. The center will include a laboratory facility to develop and test novel hardware components for quantum computing, including advanced cryogenic and microwave test capabilities.

IBM and theUniversity of Tokyowill also directly collaborateon foundational research topics important to the advancement of quantum computing, and establish a collaboration space on the University campus to engage students, faculty, and industry researchers with seminars, workshops, and events.

Developed byresearchers and engineers fromIBM Researchand Systems, the IBM Q System One is optimized for the quality, stability, reliability, and reproducibility of multi-qubit operations. IBM established theIBM Q Network, a community of Fortune 500 companies, startups, academic institutions and research labs working with IBM to advance quantum computing and explore practical applications for business and science.

Advances in quantum computing could open the door to future scientific discoveries such as new medicines and materials, improvements in the optimization of supply chains, and new ways to model financial data to better manage and reduce risk.

TheUniversity of Tokyowill lead theJapan IBM Quantum Partnership and bring academic excellence from universities and prominent research associations together with large-scale industry, small and medium enterprises, startups as well as industrial associations from diverse market sectors. A high priority will be placed on building quantum programming as well as application and technology development skills and expertise.

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IBM And University Of Tokyo Launch Quantum Computing Initiative For Japan - E3zine.com

Quantum computing, climate change, and interdependent AI: Academics and execs predict how tech will revolutionize the next decade – Business Insider

Posted on January 25, 2020 by admin

The past decade saw technological advancements that transformed how we work, live, and learn. The next one will bring even greater change as quantum computing, cloud computing, 5G, and artificial intelligence mature and proliferate. These changes will happen rapidly, and the work to manage their impact will need to keep pace.

This session at the World Economic Forum, in Davos, Switzerland, brought together industry experts to discuss how these technologies will shape the next decade, followed by a panel discussion about the challenges and benefits this era will bring and if the world can control the technology it creates.

Henry Blodget, CEO, cofounder, and editorial director, Insider Inc.

This interview is part of a partnership between Business Insider and Microsoft at the 2020 World Economic Forum. Business Insider editors independently decided on the topics broached and questions asked.

Below, find each of the panelists most memorable contributions:

Julie Love believes global problems such as climate change can potentially be solved far more quickly and easily through developments in quantum computing.

She said: We [Microsoft] think about problems that were facing: problems that are caused by the destruction of the environment; by climate change, and [that require] optimization of our natural resources, [such as] global food production.

Its quantum computing that really a lot of us scientists and technologists are looking for to solve these problems. We can have the promise of solving them exponentially faster, which is incredibly profound. And that the reason is this: [quantum] technology speaks the language of nature.

By computing the way that nature computes, theres so much information contained in these atoms and molecules. Nature doesnt think about a chemical reaction; nature doesnt have to do some complex computation. Its inherent in the material itself.

Love claimed that, if harnessed in this way, quantum computing could allow scientists to design a compound that could remove carbon from the air. She added that researchers will need to be really pragmatic and practical about how we take this from, from science fiction into the here-and-now.

I believe the future of AI is actually interdependence, collaboration, and cooperation between people and systems, both at the macro [and micro] levels, said Cassell, who is also a faculty member of the Human-Computer Interaction Institute at Carnegie Mellon University.

At the macro-level, [look], for example, at robots on the factory floor, she said. Today, theres been a lot of fear about how autonomous they actually are. First of all, theyre often dangerous. Theyre so autonomous, you have to get out of their way. And it would be nice if they were more interdependent if we could be there at the same time as they are. But also, there is no factory floor where any person is autonomous.

In Cassells view, AI systems could also end up being built collaboratively with experts from non-tech domains, such as psychologists.

Today, tools [for building AI systems] are mostly machine learning tools, she noted. And they are, as youve heard a million times, black boxes. You give [the AI system] lots of examples. You say: This is somebody being polite. That is somebody being impolite. Learn about that. But when they build a system thats polite, you dont know why they did that.

What Id like to see is systems that allow us to have these bottom-up, black-box approaches from machine learning, but also have, for example, psychologists in there, saying thats not actually really polite, or its polite in the way that you dont ever want to hear.'

One thing I constantly wish is that there was a more standardized measurement for everybody to report how much theyre spending per employee on employee training because that really doesnt exist, when you think about it, said Smith, Microsofts president and chief legal officer since 2015.

I think, anecdotally, one can get a pretty strong sense that if you go back to the 1980s and 1990s employers invested a huge amount in employee training around technology. It was teaching you how to use MS-DOS, or Windows, or how to use Word or Excel interestingly, things that employers dont really feel obliged to teach employees today.

Learning doesnt stop when you leave school. Were going to have to work a little bit harder. And thats true for everyone.

He added that this creates a further requirement: to make sure the skills people do pick up as they navigate life are easily recognizable by other employers.

Ultimately, theres a wide variety of post-secondary credentials. The key is to have credentials that employers recognize as being valuable. Its why LinkedIn and others are so focused on new credentialing systems. Now, the good news is that should make things cheaper. It all should be more accessible.

But I do think that to go back to where I started employers are going to have to invest more [in employee training]. And were going to have to find some ways to do it in a manner that perhaps is a little more standardized.

Suri said 5G will be able to help develop industries that go far beyond entertainment and telecoms, and will impact physical or manual industries such as manufacturing.

The thing about 5G is that its built for machine-type communications. When we received the whole idea of 5G, it was how do we get not just human beings to interact with each other, but also large machines, he said.

So we think that there is a large economic boost possible from 5G and 5G-enabled technologies because it would underpin many of these other technologies, especially in the physical industries.

Suri cited manufacturing, healthcare, and agriculture as just some of the industries 5G could help become far more productive within a decade.

He added: Yes, well get movies and entertainment faster, but it is about a lot of physical industries that didnt quite digitize yet. Especially in the physical industries, we [Nokia] think that the [productivity] gains could be as much as 35% starting in the year 2028 starting with the US first, and then going out into other geographies, like India, China, the European Union, and so on.

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Quantum computing, climate change, and interdependent AI: Academics and execs predict how tech will revolutionize the next decade - Business Insider