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Andrew Ng launches $175M AI fund

techcrunch.com

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Re: Andrew Ng launches $175M AI fund

#51

Post by CabSauce »

ccozan wrote: post #46

As other fellow commenters remarked, and as an AI enthusiast/researcher myself, I fail to see AI as a business. What I would like is a fund, or similar that is funding research, because fundamentally we need so much research in this area. AI as we have it now is just a bunch of ML algos and *NNs that perform well in different niches and, well, after all cat pictures were categorized, what to do next? So, in case Andr…

There are tons and tons of meaningful uses for the current state of ML. Just about every industry is full of opportunities to apply the most basic algorithms and drive tremendous value. It goes without saying that research is still valuable, but what I haven't seen yet is large, widespread use of applied ML.

Re: Andrew Ng launches $175M AI fund

#52

Post by nora4 »

agibsonccc wrote: post #39
Laurentvw wrote: post #26

Sounds interesting! Does anyone have examples of AI startups that solve real world problems? Just trying to get a picture of what companies would fit their fund.

We're "horizontal". We would not fit his definition of a vertical specific startup. (We have also been around a while though) The bulk of what we do is time series. Applications we do for real paying customers include: Detecting theft of power on the raw grid Online payments fraud Detecting people stealing from the telco network Detecting faults in assembly line machines Detecting computers about to fail Detecting ro…

I mean these are great stuff. But do you plan to be a venture-backed company (i.e. looking for hyper-growth and an exit, e.g. acquisition or IPO) or are you planning on being some sort of LLP?

The problem is that though the above may currently be a profitable business, I can't see how you will generate a "moat" and mature into a monopoly or a big market share in a vertical.

Re: Andrew Ng launches $175M AI fund

#53

Post by nora4 »

"In his view, AI businesses are also different from regular startups because you generally get a closed feedback loop that allows you to quickly see what works (and what doesn’t)."

What is he talking about here? First of all, this is just the basic lean startup methodology. Any startup (especially consumer ones) try to do that, i.e. A/B testing new features. Second, he may be referring to the case that once you have a big comprehensive dataset already gathered, then you can just iterate improving the model.

My (cynical) answer: good luck with that. The real issue with AI especially in mission-critical situations is data in edge cases. Even if you can improve on your train/test data, that barely translates to customer satisfaction unless the edge cases are treated well. And edge cases will be revealed very slowly by encountering data in the field. Just ask anybody working on voice-assistant agents (Alexa, Siri, Google one) or self-driving. It's not a fast loop by any means.

Of course, Ng probably knows all this which makes me feel even more bothered.

Re: Andrew Ng launches $175M AI fund

#54

Post by danjoc »

The amount of money in this field puzzles me. The difference between relative novice and competition winner on kaggle.com is often in the single digit percentages or less. When 26 year old George Hotz can build his own self driving car in his garage, it seems like a very narrow moat.

Re: Andrew Ng launches $175M AI fund

#55

Post by otoburb »

nora4 wrote: post #53

"In his view, AI businesses are also different from regular startups because you generally get a closed feedback loop that allows you to quickly see what works (and what doesn’t)." What is he talking about here? First of all, this is just the basic lean startup methodology. Any startup (especially consumer ones) try to do that, i.e. A/B testing new features. Second, he may be referring to the case that once you have…

>>Of course, Ng probably knows all this which makes me feel even more bothered.

Ng's implied claim is that he has a head start on how to tackle the edge cases, along with other hard problems encountered in the field, based on his experience at Baidu. This is what got him the "easy" capital raise. If he really has an edge (no pun intended), then it makes sense for him to apply it while it's still relevant.

Re: Andrew Ng launches $175M AI fund

#56

Post by otoburb »

danjoc wrote: post #54

The amount of money in this field puzzles me. The difference between relative novice and competition winner on kaggle.com is often in the single digit percentages or less. When 26 year old George Hotz can build his own self driving car in his garage, it seems like a very narrow moat.

You make it sound like George Hotz is any run-of-the-mill 26 year old, except he's anything but[1].

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Hotz

Re: Andrew Ng launches $175M AI fund

#58

Post by yeukhon »

andyjohnson0 wrote: post #50
yeukhon wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Final as in this will be the last time Ng will teach the course?

> Final as in this will be the last time Ng will teach the course? Courses on Coursera aren't really taught that way. The course instructor(s) prepare the course materials (videos, presentations, quizzes, assignments, etc.) once only. Courses start on a regular schedule and the platform, rather than the instructors, takes you through the material in sequence. There are forums with moderators for peer-support, but you…

I see, although I have seen some refresh contents in other courses on Coursera. Good to know he has a series of courses.

Re: Andrew Ng launches $175M AI fund

#59

Post by nora4 »

otoburb wrote: post #55
nora4 wrote: post #53

"In his view, AI businesses are also different from regular startups because you generally get a closed feedback loop that allows you to quickly see what works (and what doesn’t)." What is he talking about here? First of all, this is just the basic lean startup methodology. Any startup (especially consumer ones) try to do that, i.e. A/B testing new features. Second, he may be referring to the case that once you have…

>> Of course, Ng probably knows all this which makes me feel even more bothered. Ng's implied claim is that he has a head start on how to tackle the edge cases, along with other hard problems encountered in the field, based on his experience at Baidu. This is what got him the "easy" capital raise. If he really has an edge (no pun intended), then it makes sense for him to apply it while it's still relevant.

Maybe. Part of me thinks it's somewhat of a small money grab. (hope it's not.)

What I will bet money on though is that no massive success will come out of this. The key to AI is data & hardware (and not algorithm or methodology -- where everyone is essentially doing the same) and that's the domain of already giant tech companies. There can be a lot of good use cases in teaching far-off industries on how to use AI (manufacturing, etc.) but that's essentially a consulting business which will have a limited window. So lots of little successes is completely achievable; massive successes I hardly doubt.

Re: Andrew Ng launches $175M AI fund

#60

Post by person77 »

mark_l_watson wrote: post #45

Now I now why Andrew is two months late delivering the final 5th class for his deep learning Coursera specialization. He has been busy! This is really a different kind of venture, and it will be interesting in a few years to see how they do.

Is it worth learning deep learning with coursera,?I was considering doing the MIT deep learning path on YouTube. I'm not really focused on AI I just want an overview.
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