Google is set to acquire DeepMind, a London-based artificial intelligence company, for $500 million. The search engine won the deal over Facebook which has been negotiating since last year.
DeepMind Technologies was established by Demis Hassabis, a neuroscientist and a former child wonder in chess. Other names behind DeepMind are Skype and Kazaa developer Jaan Tallin and Shane Legg, a researcher. It is known for its cutting edge artificial intelligence which combines machine learning with neuroscience to develop powerful multi-purpose learning algorithms.
The technology could be used for simulations, games, and e-commerce. As of December 2013, DeepMind has 75 employees. According to LinkedIn profiles, the company started operating three years ago. They also listed Founders Fund and Horizons Venture as major investors for the company, TechCrunch reports.
According to The Information, Google has been investing a lot on artificial intelligence expertise. In December 2012, the company hired Ray Kurzweil, an entrepreneur, author, futurist, and inventor. Google have Kurzweil the job of being the director of engineering which will focus on language processing and machine learning. According to Kurzweil, he wanted to build a search engine that is so intelligent and advanced; it could be anyone's "cybernetic friend".
Google's acquisition of DeepMind will allow the company to have an advantage in the competition against major tech companies by transferring their attention to the importance of deep learning. Such examples of which is Facebook's recent hiring of Yann LeCunn, a NYU professor to lead their artificial intelligence lab, IBM's supercomputer Watson now made to work on deep learning, and Yahoo's recent acquisition of LookFlow, a photo analysis startup company.
Google and DeepMind will establish an ethic board which will ensure no abuse will be inflicted on DeepMind's artificial intelligence technology.
DeepMind is the latest acquisition for Google after buying home automation company Nest Labs for $3.2 billion early this year.
