After IIT-Bombay, IIT-Delhi joins IBM's artificial intelligence consortium

The Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Delhi, has joined an International Business Machines’ consortium that connects academic institutions across the world to researchers at IBM for developing new technologies in artificial intelligence (AI).

With this, IIT-Delhi becomes the second institution outside North America to join the firm’s AI Horizons Network. In September, TechCircle reported that IIT-Bombay had become the first institution outside North America to join the consortium.

Now, the consortium has the following members: IIT-Delhi, IIT-Bombay, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Renesselaer Polytechnic Institute, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, University of Michigan, Universite de Montreal, University of Maryland at Baltimore County, UC San Diego and University of Massachusetts at Amherst.

The latest partnership will see a collaboration between IBM researchers as well as students and teachers from IIT-Delhi on AI traits such as reasoning, comprehension and inferencing. The research will benefit sectors such as healthcare and medicine, finance, and customer support.

Focus areas in the AI Horizons Network include deep learning, natural language processing, computer vision as well as applications to aid education, cybersecurity and others. 

“While working with AI systems, organisations require explicit reasoning and comprehension to reach a particular conclusion. We believe advances in AI can tackle such problems,” said Michael Karasick, vice-president, global labs, IBM Research, in a statement.

The AI Horizons Network works with global institutes on deep learning, natural language processing, computer vision, and other focus areas in AI, as well as their application to big societal challenges, ranging from aiding the understanding of disease to education and cybersecurity.