A recent acquisition by Intel will attempt to give the world’s devices sight.
Intel recently acquired Movidius, a company that partnered with Google on its Project Tango devices. Movidius, a machine vision innovation company, has its roots in the U.S. as well as offices in Romania and Ireland. Its services were called upon to assist in the development of 3D space mapping technology for Google’s Project Tango devices.
While the terms of the deal were not disclosed, Intel is set to build on its RealSense technology initiatives, which seek to measure the depth in physical spaces to help drones avoid obstacles. This technology is also used in webcams and 3D object scanning. Intel has complimented its acquisition of Movidius with the purchase of several machine learning, cognitive computing and deep learning companies.
In a statement written by Josh Walden, a senior vice president and general manager of Intel’s New Technology Group, he explains that with this acquisition, Intel gains low-power, high-performance SoC platforms for accelerating computer vision as well as additional deep learning, depth processing, navigation and mapping, and natural interactions algorithms.
“Specifically, we will look to deploy the technology across our efforts in augmented, virtual and merged reality (AR/VR/MR), drones, robotics, digital security cameras and beyond. Movidius’ market-leading family of computer vision SoCs complements Intel’s RealSense offerings in addition to our broader IP and product roadmap,” wrote Walden.
Remi El-Ouazzane, the CEO of Movidius, goes on to explain in its statement that while its been attacking the evolution of autonomous machines from a device level, with Intel, the Movidius team will be attacking these trends from the cloud.
“When computers can see, they can become autonomous and that’s just the beginning. We’re on the cusp of big breakthroughs in artificial intelligence. In the years ahead, we’ll see new types of autonomous machines with more advanced capabilities as we make progress on one of the most difficult challenges of AI: getting our devices not just to see, but also to think,” writes El-Ouazzane.
Most recently, Movidius has seen its technology integrated into devices like the Lenovo Phab 2 Pro and will continue to focus on their mission with benefit of Intel’s added resources.
Related: Lenovo debuts first Google Tango smartphone, the Phab 2 Pro for $499 USD
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