Developers, get started with your algorithms! Amazon Web Services announced the launch of the 10-week AWS Generative AI Accelerator to speed up your AI efforts. The program provides access to AI resources, mentorship, and $300,000 in AWS credits.
With AI-powered digital assistants (Amazon’s Alexa, Apple’s Siri, Google’s Assistant, etc.) relegated to yesterday’s news, is this just a desperate bid for relevance? No, experts say.
AI development has heated up in the last few months with the launch of OpenAI’s ChatGPT. Amazon is a household name in the tech industry, and its voice-activated assistant, Alexa, was one of the first experiences most people had with natural-language-aware artificial intelligence, but Amazon is apparently out of the competition. It looks like we lost.
But industry observers say Amazon’s real strength lies in the suite of AWS applications that power much of the Internet.
“Amazon is in the business of selling shovels, not digging for gold,” said Anish Mitra, former Goldman Sachs vice president of growth. Decryption“What Amazon recognizes is that a successful AI-based business requires a large amount of computing power.”
The company may not have end-consumer applications like Google (with Bard) or Microsoft (investment and integration in OpenAI APIs), but it certainly wouldn’t be wrong to incorporate more AI into its solutions. No, says Mitra.
“Alexa has become an integral part of people’s lives, accounting for 60% of the market,” said Mitra. “It is very important for Amazon to improve it further, especially since advanced AI tools are not yet widely used by everyday consumers. %, but this may change over time.”
Just as AWS was one of the great foundations of the cloud revolution, Amazon has invested more and more in user-friendly platforms to enable developers to build and train increasingly sophisticated and concrete models, and will continue to do so in the future. Unlock billions of dollars in value over 10 years.
Amazon is investing heavily in AI, with a focus on the AWS cloud computing platform, which offers a variety of AI and machine learning services to enterprises. Amazon also uses AI in its e-commerce business, including its recommendation engine, inventory management, and logistics.
“Amazon does what it does best: it becomes a platform,” said Tiago Amaral, founder of AI education company Inevitable. DecryptionAmaral pointed to AWS’s recent partnership with AI company Hugging Face, which aims to make machine learning model development easier and more accessible.
Alexa was one of Amazon’s earliest AI-related acquisitions in 2013. Subsequent AI acquisitions include deep learning startup Orbeus in 2015, cybersecurity AI startup Harvest.ai in 2017, and robotics startup Canvas Technology in 2019. Another web traffic analysis company called Alexa Internet was acquired by Amazon in 1999 and retired in 2022.
The Amazon Accelerator Program, like others, is designed to support early-stage technology startups, providing resources, mentorship, networking opportunities, and sometimes funding to help grow and scale your business quickly. to support
Rob Ferguson, Global Head of Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning for Startups at AWS, said: Decryption“We evaluate applications based on target market, founder/market fit, depth of machine learning native product integration, and team composition related to diversity and technical/non-technical leadership.”
According to Ferguson, 10 startups will be selected to participate in the program, with mentors who are industry experts to guide them through the intricacies of generative AI development.