A group of professors and research assistants from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the US shared the latest artificial-intelligence technology with researchers from Taiwan last week.
The four-day Oxygen Alliance workshop held at Acer Inc's Aspire Park in Taoyuan County -- the first time the research group has met outside the US -- ended on Friday.
Thirty-two participants took part in the workshops, learning about at least three new speech and face recognition technologies.
Launched in June 2000, the Oxygen Alliance is a US$50 million five-year project that intends to increase computer use and make their operation more human, creating technologies to replace desktop computers and keyboards with smaller, portable electronic devices. The group is also developing voice-controlled devices that can be hidden inside the walls of buildings and structures, making computers ultimately invisible to the majority of users.
MIT delegates at the workshop shared Galaxy, SpeechBuilder, and a face and speech recognition technology with participants, teaching them how to install and make enhancements to the technologies so that they can create their own branded products. Galaxy allows technicians to integrate speech technologies into devices to create conversational language systems. SpeechBuilder is a means to allow engineers unfamiliar with speech and language processing to create their own speech-based applications.
Security applications
MIT's face and speech-recognition technology allows a face snapshot to be taken and sent to a face-detection and face-recognition server wirelessly. Participants also learned about other technologies for use in digital personal organizers and tablet PCs.
A total of 250 researchers are involved in the Oxygen Alliance, which includes two MIT laboratories, Taiwan's Acer Group and Delta Electronics Inc (
"Acer has long cooperated with world class companies to conduct research into technologies designed to fit people's most natural and practical needs, and to drive innovation in a knowledge-based economy," said a statement from the company issued during the workshop last week.
Two examples of how Acer is developing artificially intelligent technologies were given in the statement. iRobot Corp, a joint venture between Acer and MIT, launched the automatic vacuum cleaner "Roomba" last September. The pizza-sized device uses intelligent navigation technology to clean hardwood, carpet or tiled floors without the need for human direction.
SensAble Technologies, also an Acer-MIT joint venture, made the first transatlantic handshake over the Internet in October 2002, using a computer and small robotic arm in the US and the UK.
Acer launched the Acer Value Lab in October last year as part of the Oxygen Alliance project. The primary objective of Acer Value Lab "is not only to create new technologies, but also to find practical ways to implement them to the best benefit of users," Acer's written statement said.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) would not produce its most advanced technologies in the US next year, Minister of Economic Affairs J.W. Kuo (郭智輝) said yesterday. Kuo made the comment during an appearance at the legislature, hours after the chipmaker announced that it would invest an additional US$100 billion to expand its manufacturing operations in the US. Asked by Taiwan People’s Party Legislator-at-large Chang Chi-kai (張啟楷) if TSMC would allow its most advanced technologies, the yet-to-be-released 2-nanometer and 1.6-nanometer processes, to go to the US in the near term, Kuo denied it. TSMC recently opened its first US factory, which produces 4-nanometer
PROTECTION: The investigation, which takes aim at exporters such as Canada, Germany and Brazil, came days after Trump unveiled tariff hikes on steel and aluminum products US President Donald Trump on Saturday ordered a probe into potential tariffs on lumber imports — a move threatening to stoke trade tensions — while also pushing for a domestic supply boost. Trump signed an executive order instructing US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick to begin an investigation “to determine the effects on the national security of imports of timber, lumber and their derivative products.” The study might result in new tariffs being imposed, which would pile on top of existing levies. The investigation takes aim at exporters like Canada, Germany and Brazil, with White House officials earlier accusing these economies of
Teleperformance SE, the largest call-center operator in the world, is rolling out an artificial intelligence (AI) system that softens English-speaking Indian workers’ accents in real time in a move the company claims would make them more understandable. The technology, called accent translation, coupled with background noise cancelation, is being deployed in call centers in India, where workers provide customer support to some of Teleperformance’s international clients. The company provides outsourced customer support and content moderation to global companies including Apple Inc, ByteDance Ltd’s (字節跳動) TikTok and Samsung Electronics Co Ltd. “When you have an Indian agent on the line, sometimes it’s hard
PROBE CONTINUES: Those accused falsely represented that the chips would not be transferred to a person other than the authorized end users, court papers said Singapore charged three men with fraud in a case local media have linked to the movement of Nvidia’s advanced chips from the city-state to Chinese artificial intelligence (AI) firm DeepSeek (深度求索). The US is investigating if DeepSeek, the Chinese company whose AI model’s performance rocked the tech world in January, has been using US chips that are not allowed to be shipped to China, Reuters reported earlier. The Singapore case is part of a broader police investigation of 22 individuals and companies suspected of false representation, amid concerns that organized AI chip smuggling to China has been tracked out of nations such
RSS