Scale AI helping to fill industry demand for leading edge AI research
Montreal, Quebec - May 27, 2020
Scale AI announces that the artificial intelligence (AI) supercluster will invest $10 million to support the creation of at least ten university chairs dedicated to AI across the country, doubling a corresponding amount contributed by universities, for a total of $20 million.
The development of university chairs is a key element of our AI talent development strategy in Quebec and across Canada, contributing to the development of the entire ecosystem, in partnership with industry. The goal is to attract and retain some of the world's greatest AI researchers, support ambitious research programs and develop the next generation of AI experts.
"Canada has a global reputation for leadership in AI. I am glad to see Scale AI is making strategic investments to build capacity in the AI ecosystem and create IP that can help industry partners in their efforts to grow and expand. This will help not only with skill development, but also provide a resource to Scale AI's industry partners to leverage the AI expertise of our researchers. This strategic co-investment with the Government of Canada has the potential to address important industrial challenges, as well as to improve the quality of life of Canadians," said The Honourable Navdeep Bains, Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry of Canada.
"This strategic co-investment with the Government of Canada has the potential to address important industrial challenges"
— The Honourable Navdeep Bains, Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry of Canada.
Julien Billot, CEO of Scale AI, stated, "University research is inseparable from business innovation. These two aspects of innovation challenge one another, inspire one another and push us to go further together. To develop a truly collaborative and flourishing ecosystem, we must encourage the emergence of talents who can generate mutually beneficial interactions and new Canadian intellectual property sources. "
"We believe the creation of several AI research chairs is an additional lever to attract talent and stimulate innovation at all levels"
— Julien Billot, CEO of Scale AI
"Artificial intelligence is exploding all over the planet, as is the demand from industry for professional AI experts in operations research and machine learning. Large tech companies hire the best AI professors on a full-time or part-time basis. This creates a significant problem for universities, which are under pressure to train an exponential number of AI talents and are in need of experts to teach and train future AI students, professors and researchers. As the best researchers like to collaborate with other strong researchers, these chairs are being created with the aim of recruiting high-level experts," added Hélène Desmarais, Co-Chair of the Scale AI Board of Directors.
Research teams, universities or faculties that are interested are invited to present their project to Scale AI. A webinar, which presents the program, as well as the ways to prepare and submit a project proposal, are available on the scaleai.ca website.
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