Photo: John Markoff |
Now Silicon Valley has found its next shiny new thing. And it does not have a “Like” button.
The new era in Silicon Valley centers on artificial intelligence
and robots, a transformation that many believe will have a payoff on
the scale of the personal computing industry or the commercial internet,
two previous generations that spread computing globally. Computers have
begun to speak, listen and see, as well as sprout legs, wings and
wheels to move unfettered in the world.
The
shift was evident in a Lowe’s home improvement store here this month,
when a prototype inventory checker developed by Bossa Nova Robotics
silently glided through the aisles using computer vision to
automatically perform a task that humans have done manually for
centuries.
The
robot, which was skilled enough to autonomously move out of the way of
shoppers and avoid unexpected obstacles in the aisles, alerted people to
its presence with soft birdsong chirps. Gliding down the middle of an
aisle at a leisurely pace, it can recognize bar codes on shelves, and it
uses a laser to detect which items are out of stock.
Silicon
Valley’s financiers and entrepreneurs are digging into artificial
intelligence with remarkable exuberance. The region now has at least 19
companies designing self-driving cars and trucks, up from a handful five
years ago. There are also more than a half-dozen types of mobile
robots, including robotic bellhops and aerial drones, being
commercialized.
“We saw a slow trickle in investments in robotics, and suddenly, boom — there seem to be a dozen companies securing large investment rounds focusing on specific robotic niches,” said Martin Hitch, chief executive of Bossa Nova, which has a base in San Francisco.
“We saw a slow trickle in investments in robotics, and suddenly, boom — there seem to be a dozen companies securing large investment rounds focusing on specific robotic niches,” said Martin Hitch, chief executive of Bossa Nova, which has a base in San Francisco.
Funding
in A.I. start-ups has increased more than fourfold to $681 million in
2015, from $145 million in 2011, according to the market research firm
CB Insights. The firm estimates that new investments will reach $1.2
billion this year, up 76 percent from last year.
“Whenever there is a new idea, the valley swarms it,” said Jen-Hsun Huang, chief executive of Nvidia, a chip maker that was founded to make graphic processors for the video game business but that has turned decisively toward artificial intelligence applications in the last year. “But you have to wait for a good idea, and good ideas don’t happen every day.”
“Whenever there is a new idea, the valley swarms it,” said Jen-Hsun Huang, chief executive of Nvidia, a chip maker that was founded to make graphic processors for the video game business but that has turned decisively toward artificial intelligence applications in the last year. “But you have to wait for a good idea, and good ideas don’t happen every day.”
By
contrast, funding for social media start-ups peaked in 2011 before
plunging. That year, venture capital firms made 66 social media deals
and pumped in $2.4 billion. So far this year, there have been just 10
social media investments, totaling $6.9 million, according to CB
Insights. Last month, the professional social networking site LinkedIn was sold to Microsoft for $26.2 billion, underscoring that social media has become a mature market sector.
Read more... Source: New York Times