Facial recognition startup Clearview AI told investors that it aims to have 100 billion facial photos of people in its database within a year, which would be enough to identify "everyone in the world." The numbers were based on a financial presentation that the company gave in December, which The Washington Post obtained and wrote about. More: - The company's "pitch deck" was presented in an effort to obtain $50M in new funding from investors, which would help Clearview further pursue its goals.
- The company said it now has 10 billion images pulled from the web, up from 3 billion in 2020, and is adding roughly 1.5 billion every month.
- A $50M investment round would help Clearview expand its sales team, develop new products, and fund lobbying efforts to support regulations in its favor, according to reports.
- The update comes after several U.S. Democratic lawmakers asked federal agencies, including the DOJ and DOD, to stop using Clearview AI, claiming its system threatens people's privacy rights and civil liberties.
Zoom-out: - In a Vice report published this week, Clearview's CEO said Airbnb, Lyft, and Uber have "expressed interest" in using Clearview's face recognition platform to verify people's identities.
- However, the companies have no plans to work with Clearview at this time, he noted.
- Clearview AI recently secured a contract to research augmented reality glasses for the U.S. Air Force.
THE WASHINGTON POST 
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Conversational AI and automation platform Uniphore raised a $400M Series E round led by NEA, pushing its valuation to $2.5B. The financing is the largest ever raised in the call center AI market. Uniphore uses AI/natural-language processing to analyze customers' conversations with enterprises and try and determine what they are thinking/feeling to produce better responses. More: - Uniphore's technology combines conversational AI, workflow automation, and RPA (Robotic Process Automation).
- The company has an intelligent virtual assistant, U-Self Serve, that can converse in multiple languages and pass off queries to the right human agents.
- Its software can offer suggestions to agents on how to better interact with a customer. It also transcribes conversations and produces post-call analyses for further review.
- The company will use the funds to improve its technology with advancements in voice AI, computer vision, and tonal emotion, as well as to expand its business operations globally, specifically in North America, Europe, and Asia Pacific.
- Uniphore has made two major acquisitions so far: Emotion Research Lab for added capabilities in emotion AI, and Jacada for enhanced low-code/no-code capabilities.
- The company has raised $610M to date.
Some of this information appeared in Inside Venture Capital, our newsletter covering the latest deals, news, and firms in VC. CRUNCHBASE NEWS
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AI lending company Upstart Holdings reported Q4 sales of $304.8M, up 252% from the year-ago quarter. In a statement, CEO and co-founder Dave Girouard said 2021 will be the year that AI-powered lending made it to the forefront, initiating the most "impactful transformation of credit in decades." More: - Upstarts partners with banks and credit unions to expand access to affordable credit.
- The company says its fully automated platform has higher approval rates and lower loss rates.
- The company is now projecting $1.4B in revenue in 2022, which would be a 65% growth rate over 2021.
- Its AI platform was used to generate $4.1B in loans last quarter, a 4x increase in volume.
- The company is seeing auto loan originations on its platform grow rapidly, Girouard noted.
- On Tuesday, Upstart announced a $400M share repurchase program.
PYMNTS.COM
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 U.S.-based researchers published the most AI research papers in 2021, followed closely by China, according to the latest Statista data. The People's Republic has seen a 3,350% increase in the number of AI papers published since 2000. More: - In 2008, China eclipsed all countries in the European Union in the number of published AI papers.
- In 2021, it published 138,000 papers, compared to 150,000 in the U.S.
- China is doing well in AI in part due to its large amount of generated data.
- In 2020, China accounted for nearly 21% of the total AI-related academic citations, compared to 19.8% for the U.S.
- This comes after the U.S. National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence warned last year that China could overtake the U.S. on AI initiatives.
STATISTA
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Volkswagen is in discussions to acquire an autonomous driving unit from Chinese telecom giant Huawei. The acquisition, expected to be in the billions of euros, would also include technical systems that are new to Volkswagen. More: - The news comes a day after Volkswagen CEO Chief Executive Herbert Diess said he expects to see widespread self-driving vehicles on roads within 25 years.
- VW is a key investor in Argo, a developer of self-driving technology.
- On March 9, Volkswagen said it will display a production-ready version of its electric ID Buzz Microbus — VW's first vehicle to come with Argo AI's autonomous driving system.
- VW plans to sell a passenger and commercial version of the minivan starting in 2023.
- Last year, Volkswagen announced a new software and autonomous driving-based business strategy. The company stated they plan for autonomous electric taxis or shuttles by the end of the decade.
REUTERS
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Nvidia, which has invested heavily in AI in recent years, projects strong growth in the current quarter, driven by "exceptional" demand for its chips powering AI and other advanced applications, CEO Jensen Huang said. In the quarter ending January, the chipmaker's revenue was $7.64B, up 53% YoY. More: - Annual sales of its data center business were up 71%, reaching $3.26B.
- Driving Nvidia's data center growth are new business use cases for AI.
- Businesses are turning more to AI for natural language processing and deep machine learning initiatives, according to VP and CFO Colette Kress.
- The company projects revenue of $8.1B in the current quarter, well above analyst expectations of $7.29B.
- Nvidia's supply constraints also appear to be easing, Huang noted.
Zoom-out: - This week marked Nvidia's first earnings reports since the company walked away from a $66B deal to acquire chip designer Arm earlier this month.
- This week, Jaguar Land Rover said it will use Nvidia's Drive Hyperion 8 computer architecture and sensors for driver assistance and autonomous vehicles.
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 |  | Beth is an Inside Analyst and a former public policy/investigative reporter. She has covered AI, VR, technology, and e-commerce for Inside. When she's not busy writing, she's hiking in Arizona's desert, playing pickleball, or trying out new Mexican food recipes. |   | | Editor | Aaron Crutchfield is based in the high desert of California. Over the last two decades, he has spent time writing and editing at various local newspapers and defense contractors in California. When he's not working, he can often be found looking at the latest memes with his kids or working on his 1962 Ford. | |
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