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| Hey Insiders, Welcome to Inside AI! Here are today's top stories: - EU Parliament approves landmark AI rules.
- Developers' AI usage survey.
- AWS considers AMD AI chips for cloud services.
- Mistral AI's record-breaking seed funding round.
Scroll down for the weekly AI funding roundup and our "question of the week," then let us know which tech topics you'd like to see more of in future issues! Cheers, Beth
p/beth-duckett | |
| 1 | | European lawmakers on Wednesday gave approval to the world's first comprehensive rules governing AI. The legislation still needs to go through negotiations before a final version is passed later this year. More: - On Wednesday, the AI Act gained strong backing from European Parliament members, with 499 votes in favor, 28 against, and 93 abstentions.
- The act aims to ban high-risk AI applications and raise transparency requirements.
- AI is categorized into four risk levels, ranging from minimal to unacceptable.
What's banned: - Under the law, real-time facial recognition, emotion recognition systems, and "social scoring" systems would be banned.
- Companies like Clearview AI would be barred from scraping biometric data from social media to create databases.
- Predictive policing tools are also not allowed.
- While not banned outright, riskier applications like resume scanners and AI tech geared toward children would undergo extra scrutiny.
What about ChatGPT? - While initially not included, lawmakers later added provisions to cover generative AI models like ChatGPT and Bard.
- While the systems can continue operating, they have to abide by some transparency requirements.
- For example, the law requires thorough documentation of any copyrighted material used to train AI systems in generating human-like text, images, video, and music.
- This way, content creators can know if their blog posts, books, and more were used to train algorithms.
- It would require makers to establish safeguards to prevent AI systems from generating illegal content.
What's next: - Representatives from the European Parliament, European Commission, and Council of the European Union will now negotiate a final version of the law.
- Once passed, there will be a roughly two-year grace period. After that, EU member states would have the power to enforce the rules, like requiring companies to remove apps from the market if they're found in violation.
- Violations could lead to fines of up to 40M euros ($43.3M) or 7% of a company's global revenue.
- It's likely the rules will serve as a model for similar regulations worldwide.
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| 2 | | Most coders are using or plan to use AI tools such as GitHub Copilot and ChatGPT in their workflows, according to Stack Overflow's 2023 Developer Survey. More: - The programmer Q&A site, which received 90,000 responses from 185 countries, found that 77% of respondents had a favorable view of using AI in their development workflows.
- 70% already use or plan to use AI tools this year.
- However, only 42% trust these AI coding tools. Of those, even fewer — only 3% — expressed a high level of trust in their outputs.
- Developers from India, Brazil, and Poland were more likely to adopt AI tools compared to their counterparts from the U.S., U.K., and France.
- Among the respondents, most reported using ChatGPT as the top AI search tool, followed by Bing AI and WolframAlpha.
- In addition to AI search tools, Stack Overflow asked about AI developer tools, with GitHub Copilot taking the top spot.
- Developers with less experience are more inclined to use AI tools. However, as developers gain more experience, their likelihood of using AI tools drops. In fact, over 40% of developers with over 21 years of experience said they have no intention of using these tools. This could be in part because more experienced developers often work on intricate projects or code structures that don't benefit from AI tools.
- Most developers currently using AI tools report using them to write code. Notably, those not interested in using AI tools find writing code the least beneficial.
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| 3 | | Amazon Web Services (AWS) is considering using Advanced Micro Devices' (AMD) new AI chips in its cloud services. The contract could potentially give AMD a significant boost in the AI computing market, which is dominated by Nvidia. More: - AMD recently introduced its most advanced GPU, the MI300x, which aims to excel in high-performance AI tasks.
- As the largest cloud computing provider globally, AWS is exploring a partnership with AMD as a potential chip supplier, though a final decision has not been reached.
- AWS recently declined the opportunity to collaborate with Nvidia on the DGX Cloud offering, an all-inclusive AI supercomputer in the cloud.
- Lisa Su, the CEO of AMD, expressed confidence in the value of choice and customization for customers.
- The MI300x is expected to ship to some customers later this year.
Zoom out: - The market for AI processors for cloud and data centers is expected to experience significant growth, with projected revenue of $38B by 2026.
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| 4 | | French AI startup Mistral AI, founded by former Google's DeepMind and Meta researchers, has raised a record €105M ($113M) in seed funding, making it the largest-ever seed round in Europe. While only four weeks old, Mistral AI is competing with OpenAI in the development of large language models and generative AI. More: - Mistral AI, headquartered in Paris, was founded by former Meta researchers Timothée Lacroix and Guillaume LampleLample and former Google DeepMind researcher Arthur Mensch.
- The company is focused on open-source models and datasets and aims to cater to enterprise customers.
- While it has yet to launch its first product, the startup plans to release its first text-based generative AI models in early 2024.
Zoom out: - The funding round, led by Lightspeed Venture Partners, values the company at €240M ($260M).
- Its funding round marks a significant milestone in Europe's AI investment landscape, with over $4B invested in AI-related companies in the region this year.
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| 5 | | 🍋 MORE FRESH FUNDING 🍋 - AI-powered video generation platform Synthesia raised $90M Series C funding led by Accel at a $1B post-money valuation. Nvidia's VC arm NVentures, Kleiner Perkins, GV, Firstmark Capital, and others backed the funding round.
- San Francisco-based AI-powered data analysis solutions provider Primer Technologies held the first close of its Series D round at $69M. Addition led the funding round with participation from the U.S. Innovative Technology Fund (USIT).
- Legal AI startup EvenUp secured $50.5M in Series B funding at a $325M valuation. Bessemer Venture Partners led the funding with participation from Bain Capital Ventures, SignalFire, DCM, NFX, and others.
- NEA and Bain Capital Ventures led a capital infusion of $45M into the AI efficiency platform Granica.
- British blockchain-powered AI computing resources provider Gensyn raised $43M in Series A funding led by Andreessen Horowitz. CoinFund, Canonical Crypto, Protocol Labs, Eden Block, and others participated in the funding round.
- Austin, Texas-based machine learning operations solutions maker Striveworks secured $33M through an equity fundraising led by Centana Growth Partners.
- German autonomous trucking startup Fernride secured $31M in Series A funding led by logistics firm HHLA's corporate VC arm, with participation from 10x Founders, Promus Ventures, SpeedInvest, Fly Ventures, and others.
- AptEdge, a Redwood City, California-based generative AI startup focusing on technical customer service, nabbed $11M through its oversubscribed seed+ funding round led by Stage 2 Capital.
For the latest on AI startup funding and more in the VC community, subscribe to our Inside Venture Capital newsletter. | | | |
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 | AI and technology writer | | Beth is a writer and editor at Inside.com covering artificial intelligence and daily technology news. She has written the Inside AI newsletter since 2019. You can reach her at Beth.Duckett@inside.com. | | This newsletter was edited by Aaron Crutchfield | |
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