The Ask AI news roundup highlights the recent innovations, investments, and breakthroughs in Canada's artificial intelligence sector.
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Editor's picks
💰 Toronto's Cohere, a friend of the Ask AI podcast, has raised $250M from Nvidia, Oracle, Salesforce, Inovia Capital, and Index Ventures to take on the LLM giants. Full story
🚨 UK/Canadian AI pioneer Geoffrey Hinton has stepped down from Google and is warning about the potential dangers of AI. Full story
👋 Toronto startup SmartArm has tested a 3D-printed, AI-powered bionic arm that can identify objects and use fingers and wrist to perform natural movements. Full story
💼 In a Canadian first, a court has approved the use of AI technology to write a legal decision that impacts someone's rights. Full story
⚕️ Scientists at McMaster University and MIT have used AI to accelerate the discovery of an antibiotic to fight A. baumanni, a deadly hospital superbug. Full story
🧐 IDC report finds digital transformation within Canada's public sector significantly impaired by security challenges and disconnected inter-departmental systems. Full story
Breakthroughs & Investments
👀 Canadian AI pioneer Yoshua Bengio says regulation in Canada is on the right path, but advancing far too slowly. Full story
🖥 Thomson Reuters will invest $100M annually in Generative AI, partnering with Microsoft for legal research and expanding AI capabilities across its product suite. Full story
Governance & Ethics
📰 Canadian Journalism Foundation poll shows majority of Canadians (92%) believe news orgs should have clear policies on how they use AI to produce information. Full story
📊 Statistics Canada launches Centre for Municipal and Local Data portal to provide local economic, social, and environmental data. Full story
🤖 Alberta, British Columbia and Quebec have joined investigation into ChatGPT and unlawful collection, use and disclosure of personal information without consent. Full story
🌎 The G7 has initiated the "Hiroshima AI process" for the development of international technical standards for trustworthy AI. Full story
Canada Artificial Intelligence in Healthcare
👂 Saskatoon high school student, Yurui Qin, has won a Canada-Wide Science Fair for using AI to help hearing impaired joggers. Full story
🦾 Vancouver-based Axniix is using Taiwanese tech to develop “disinfecting robot” with a UV light on its “arm” to support nursing, security, and delivery tasks. Full story
🏥 Trillium Health Partners has adopted 'Discharge Predictor', an AI tool that predicts patient care needs to improve hospital flow. Full story
Sustainability
🐠 Montreal's Möbius has been named world top 10 AI project for sustainable development by UNESCO for protecting whales and other marine mammals. Full story
🏙 Professor Seungjae Lee has kicked off 'Grid-Interactive Smart Campus Buildings', a 3 yr project to optimize heating and cooling systems in U of T buildings with AI tech. Full story
Social
💸 Canada has pledged $2M to Voilà Community Help, a non-profit organization that focuses on French-language teaching via metaverse technology. Full story
🗣 Canada is updating regulations on the use of AI in the public service while the Public Service Alliance of Canada is incorporating new language around AI in collective agreements. Full story
📲 A new poll of Canadian and US small businesses finds 66% will try Generative AI tech next year, and 44% expect to hire fewer people because of AI. Full story
Agriculture & Food Security
🙏 Canada is investing $1M in Bioimaging Research Solutions Inc to develop an AI that improves disease surveillance for bovine tuberculosis in livestock. Full story
Education
👩🏫 McMaster University has formed task force to explore AI's impact on teaching to provide educators with a roadmap for incorporating AI. Full story
📚 An expert committee in Quebec will investigate the use of generative AI in higher education, particularly in relation to content and assessment. Full story
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