Robin Li reveals Baidu Brain AI will become the new era of electricity

In 2016, as the dividends from mobile Internet faded, artificial intelligence is becoming a new competition in Silicon Valley and even the global technology community.

Regarding the epochal significance of AI, Baidu gave a rather shocking definition at the 2016 World Conference: AI is equivalent to the Fourth Industrial Revolution and will bring about changes in many industries, just like the significance of electricity to the world 100 years ago.

Baidu founder, chairman and CEO Robin Li said that the growth brought by the mobile Internet utilizing the demographic dividend has gradually peaked, and the Internet is entering the next era of artificial intelligence, which will bring transformative development to the entire society.

The full picture of "Baidu Brain" is revealed

From Pygmalion's Galatea in ancient Greek mythology, to Leonardo da Vinci's robot in the Middle Ages, to the novel "Rossum's Universal Robots" by Czech science fiction writer Karel Capek, humans have never stopped imagining artificial intelligence. As one of the earliest technology companies to deploy artificial intelligence, Baidu's research and development progress of Baidu Brain has always attracted attention from the outside world.

According to Robin Li, Baidu Brain currently consists of three main aspects, namely algorithms (neural networks, parameters and sample training), computing power (servers and GPU clusters), and big data (web data, search data, image and video data, and positioning data). Focusing on the above three aspects, Baidu Brain will apply four capabilities, including natural language processing, speech recognition, image recognition processing, and user profiling.

Artificial intelligence allows people to see the infinite possibilities of combining technology and voice. According to Robin Li, Baidu's new generation of deep speech recognition system Deep Speech 2, which is based on deep learning, has a current recognition accuracy rate of 97%. MIT Technology Review rated it as one of the "Top Ten Breakthrough Technologies of 2016" and believes that this technology will greatly change people's lives in a few years.

Image capabilities are an extension of human vision. Whether it is a static picture or a dynamic video, Baidu's image technology can accurately identify and understand it. In terms of face recognition, it can already achieve an accuracy rate of 99.7%.

Natural language processing capabilities have greatly improved the language proficiency of machines. Baidu's machine translation currently supports 27 languages, and through natural language processing, machine translation can look less "machine-like".

The ability to create user portraits is inseparable from Baidu's extensive user base. Every day, more than 1 billion users use Baidu products, and their behaviors form the data foundation for the user portrait capability. Baidu Brain's high-precision model analyzes and mines data from Baidu's more than 80 product lines and partners, and obtains a user label system at the tens of millions level, and labels and draws portraits based on different user behavior characteristics.

How to release the application value of AI

Looking at the global AI industry chain, the maturity of multiple AI technologies such as voice, image, and human-computer interaction has significantly improved; large-scale mergers and acquisitions and financing in the field of intelligent robots continue to drive the industry chain toward maturity; artificial intelligence is accelerating its penetration into traditional vertical fields such as medical care, education, finance, and automobiles. And technology giants such as Google, Microsoft, Apple, and Alibaba are also focusing their future research and development on the field of artificial intelligence, which is seen as a new economic growth pole after mobile Internet.

However, it should be clear that artificial intelligence itself cannot bring huge user value. Only by combining AI technology with products and truly integrating it into user scenarios can AI truly create social value.

As the curtain of the era of change opens, in order to help our partners fully share the AI ​​era and complete the next stage of transformation and upgrading, Robin Li said that Baidu Brain will be fully open in the future. Baidu Brain will be combined with various industries to derive industry brains in different fields, such as medical brain, transportation brain, financial brain, etc.

At present, Baidu Brain has already collided with different fields. For example, L'Oréal has made innovations in brand marketing based on Baidu's AR technology and achieved sales breakthroughs; Legendary Pictures, the producer of "World of Warcraft", used Baidu's user portrait capabilities to achieve accurate recommendations and increase box office.

It is worth mentioning that NVIDIA co-founder and CEO Jensen Huang delivered a keynote speech at the conference and jointly announced with Baidu that they would continue to deepen cooperation in the field of driverless cars. The two parties will bring together Baidu Cloud Platform, map technology and NVIDIA automotive artificial intelligence computing platform to create a platform from cloud services to autonomous driving.

It is understood that as of 2015, there were 855 AI start-ups in the world, covering 13 categories, with a total valuation of more than US$8.7 billion. There is no doubt that at the turning point of the era, grasping AI means grasping the future. As the earliest company to deploy in the field of AI, Baidu is fully open to help traditional enterprises and developers upgrade, which is also a manifestation of promoting the development of the entire social economy under the new economic normal.

As a winner of Toutiao's Qingyun Plan and Baijiahao's Bai+ Plan, the 2019 Baidu Digital Author of the Year, the Baijiahao's Most Popular Author in the Technology Field, the 2019 Sogou Technology and Culture Author, and the 2021 Baijiahao Quarterly Influential Creator, he has won many awards, including the 2013 Sohu Best Industry Media Person, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Beijing Third Place, the 2015 Guangmang Experience Award, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Finals Third Place, and the 2018 Baidu Dynamic Annual Powerful Celebrity.