US chip maker Intel has announced a range of products and investments to expand and speed up the growth of artificial intelligence (AI).
The company is bringing together a broad set of technology options to boost AI capabilities in every field from smart factories and drones to sports, fraud detection and autonomous cars.
At an industry gathering, Intel CEO Brian Krzanich said that the chip maker has the assets and know-how needed to drive the computing transformation.
Krzanich said: “Intel is uniquely capable of enabling and accelerating the promise of AI. Intel is committed to AI and is making major investments in technology and developer resources to advance AI for business and society.”
As part of the strategy, the company has introduced a data center computing portfolio for AI, the new Intel Nervana platform.
Intel said that the portfolio, which is built for speed and ease of use, is the foundation for highly optimised AI solutions.
The company has also revealed the details of where the breakthrough technology from 
Nervana will be integrated into the product roadmap.
Intel plans to test first silicon, which is code-named Lake Crest, in the first half of 2017 and will make it available to key customers later in the year.
The roadmap outlined by the company also included the launch of new product, code-named Knights Crest that tightly integrates Intel Xeon processors with the technology from Nervana.
Intel Data Center Group executive vice president and general manager Diane Bryant said: “We expect the Intel Nervana platform to produce breakthrough performance and dramatic reductions in the time to train complex neural networks.
“Before the end of the decade, Intel will deliver a 100-fold increase in performance that will turbocharge the pace of innovation in the emerging deep learning space.”
Bryant also announced that the company expects the next generation of Intel Xeon Phi processors will deliver up to four times improved performance than the previous versions for deep learning.
The processors will be made available in 2017.
Intel also announced it is shipping a preliminary version of the next generation of Intel Xeon processors to select cloud service providers.
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The company also highlighted other AI assets, including Intel Saffron Technology, which leverages memory-based reasoning techniques and transparent analysis of heterogeneous data.
It has also formed a strategic alliance with Google to deliver technology integrations focused on Kubernetes (containers), machine learning, security and IoT.
As part of its efforts to maximise the positive impact of AI, Intel has announced $25m funding to the Broad Institute.
The funding is aimed at boosting high-performance computing for genomics analytics.
Intel Software and Services Group senior vice president and general manager Doug Fisher said: “Intel can offer crucial technologies to drive the AI revolution, but ultimately we must work together as an industry – and as a society – to achieve the ultimate potential of AI.”
