Tech Layoffs Are Opening Jobs With Farmers

02-14-2023

February 14, 2023

⚡ Today’s Highlights

  • 📰 News: Tech layoffs are good news for Robo-Farming

  • 💰 Funding: eBay acquires 3PM Shield and Scale AI gets a major cash infusion

  • 🦾 Tools: Fine-tuned text to video and an all-in-one AI toolkit for photo editing and copywriting

  • 📅 Events: Jasper’s Gen AI Conference is today!

📰 Today's Top Stories

(6 min read) (Source: Reuters)

TLDR: Agricultural and construction equipment manufacturers in the American Midwest are trying to attract tech workers who have been affected by hiring freezes and layoffs in Silicon Valley. The mass layoffs in tech have created job opportunities in the tractor and machinery industry, leading companies such as Deere & Co. and Caterpillar Inc. to recruit tech workers to expand into autonomous tractors and smart farming technology.

The companies are offering remote work arrangements and opening new offices in major cities like Chicago and Austin to attract workers who don't want to move to smaller Midwestern cities where many of these companies are based. Caterpillar has boosted recruitment efforts, with a 30% increase in new hires in machine learning, computer science, and software engineering from the previous year, and has roughly 500 open tech jobs.

Deere and CNH have increased investment in AI and precision agriculture products to sell to farmers who are trying to increase food production during global shortages. However, experts say the hiring window is short and companies need to act quickly to attract tech workers who also have opportunities at startups.

The Big Picture: Robo-farming is coming soon. These innovations might help in making the farming industry more efficient and environmentally friendly while increasing food availability and minimizing food waste. Check out careers at John Deere here and careers at Caterpillar here.

(5 min read) (Source: Neeva)

TLDR: Neeva Inc. is a new ad-free, subscription-based search engine that uses generative AI to deliver relevant information in real time. Neeva's AI model summarizes pages, processes links, and provides summarized answers with embedded citations, acting as a real-time encyclopedia search. The model is constantly updated with the latest information, though not all queries will have the most recent information.

If Neeva's AI can't provide a generative response, it will fall back on the traditional search display. Neeva launched in the U.S. in 2021 and in Europe in late 2022 and uses its large independent search index of billions of pages to constantly expand and train its AI model for timely, fast, and relevant search results.

The Big Picture: A new player enters the search engine war! I wonder if the biases and misinformation concerns that are currently holding back the popular search engines and chatbots will open up an opportunity for smaller companies to stake their claim in the search engine game. Privacy and trustworthy information are becoming valuable commodities and the smaller organizations, with smaller and more tailored data sets, might just be able to get ahead of the big tech companies on this one.

(10 min read) (Source: New York Times)

TLDR: The rise of generative artificial intelligence not only poses a threat to manual labor jobs but also to the jobs of artists. AI systems, such as Stable Diffusion, were developed by analyzing images and text from the internet without obtaining consent or permission from artists, causing harm to their originality and business. To address this issue, computer science researchers at the University of Chicago created a tool called Glaze to prevent AI models from learning an artist's style.

The tool modifies the artist's work at the pixel level, making it appear similar to the original for the human eye but different to a computer learning model. The researchers collaborated with over 1000 artists to develop their database and algorithms to train Glaze. Although the tool does not provide full protection and could result in countermeasures by those determined to emulate an artist, it serves as a temporary solution until laws and regulations can catch up.

The Big Picture: Glaze presents a glimmer of hope for artists whose intellectual property might have been illegally used by one of the large generative AI tools sweeping the internet. There have already been several lawsuits against these generative AI tools that used the work of independent artists without their permission. Glaze presents an important tool for these artists to use in the fight to preserve the integrity of their work.

(5 min read) (Source: Opera)

TLDR: Yet another company joins the race for search engine supremacy. Opera has announced plans to integrate AI tools into its PC and mobile browsers, expanding its existing AI-generated content programs into its browser, news and gaming products. These services will start with the browser sidebar, and the company is working on new features that will interact with these capabilities, including a "Shorten" button in the address bar that will generate short summaries of webpages or articles using AI. This follows Opera's track record of providing direct access to popular platforms such as TikTok, Telegram, and WhatsApp. Stay tuned for more.

(8 min read) (Source: MIT News)

TLDR: Verta is a startup spun out of MIT's Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory that helps companies incorporate machine-learning models into their business in a safe and scalable manner. Their platform provides tools for data scientists and engineers to track different versions of models, audit them for bias, test them before deployment, and monitor their performance. Verta is currently working with large companies in healthcare, finance, and insurance, as well as high-growth tech companies, to help them deploy, monitor, and manage their machine-learning models.

Verta's platform helps speed up the deployment of new AI-enabled solutions while ensuring their appropriate usage. The platform helps data scientists track how models were built, including data usage and bias checks run. They can also vet models by running them through deployment checklists and security scans, and ensure they continue working as intended over time while being compliant and governed. Verta's platform provides a solution to ensure the integrity of machine-learning models in the growing trend of AI incorporation in companies.

The Big Picture: Verta is presenting a big leap in the fight to free AI tools of bias and misinformation. Vetting AI tools when they are released and continuously inspecting them throughout their use will become increasingly important as they become mainstream tools and take over important tasks like search and data processing.

💰 Funding Alerts

  1. eBay has acquired 3PM Shield, a Chicago-based provider of marketplace compliance solutions. 3PM Shield offers an AI-based brand protection and compliance software platform to enhance buyer and seller trust. The acquisition will help eBay strengthen its monitoring solutions and prevent the sale of counterfeit, unsafe, and illegal products. The amount of the deal was not disclosed.

  2. Scale AI, a Canadian consortium of private entities, research centers, universities, and startups focused on developing AI-powered applications for supply-chain activities, has received a record-breaking financing round of $117 million. The funding, from various companies and the federal government, will support 15 AI projects in areas such as manufacturing, retail, agriculture, and the development of AI solutions for businesses. The funding will also enable further investments in 6 existing projects to be deployed on a larger scale for the benefit of the AI ecosystem.

  3. MONIX Co., Ltd., an AI-powered digital lending platform based in Bangkok, has secured $20 million in the first close of its pre-IPO fundraising. The investment round was led by SCBX and a new investor Lombard Asia, a Southeast Asian growth-focused private equity manager. The funds will be used to accelerate the growth and expansion of digital lending and financial product offerings, bolster customer growth and engagement, and enhance financial inclusion through the innovation of their services.

🦾 Trending Tools

  • Transform text into visually stunning video art and clips with Astria Video's powerful combination of fine-tuning and AI technology, allowing you to train your own personalized AI model and effortlessly switch between images with prompt text commands.

  • Booltool, the all-in-one AI-powered cloud toolkit for your photo editing and copywriting needs, helps you transform your resources into stunning content effortlessly.

  • With Study Fetch, students can upload educational resources such as PowerPoints, class notes, and study guides, and then utilize AI technology to generate interactive tools such as flashcards, quizzes, mnemonics, and more. Use the power of AI to spend less time stressing and more time preparing.

  • Imagen streamlines photo editing in Adobe Lightroom Classic with its AI-powered technology that creates a personalized experience by learning and applying your preferred adjustments for white balance, exposure, colour correction, and more.

🌎 Popular Content

Speaking of AI companies that went from startup to superstar, Jasper is looking to acquire some new AI products and teams with their “fat stack of cash”. (Twitter)

2. Leo’s got an important message to present here but man I really want to see a recreation of The Revenant with Leonardo DeKardashian. (Twitter)

3. We’re… Sydney? Bing’s new chatbot has been saying some pretty weird things to users. Check out the rest of the conversation here. (Reddit)

Another Reddit user was also receiving weird love messages from Bing unprompted. Fair warning, this conversation is quite long and gets NSFW at points. (Reddit)

5. While this is a meme and ChatGPT/Bing are probably not “military weapons”, it does raise some very crucial points regarding the safety of information and who will end up influencing the information economy. Deepfakes are already causing problems and, as they become more convincing, could make misinformation all too easy to spread. (YouTube)

👀 More Reading

🧠 Resources

The Computer History Museum presents "Revolution: The First 2000 Years of Computing". This episode discusses the origins of artificial intelligence from the coining of the term to Alan Turing’s famous Turing Test.

 📅 Upcoming Events

  1. The Gen AI Conference (TODAY February 14, 2023 / San Francisco, CA) hosted by Jasper AI, is the first-ever generative AI conference. Attendees can learn about the many recent developments in the field of AI from experts and network with like-minded individuals in AI, business, and marketing. The event’s sold out, but check here for more news!

  2. RE•WORK AI Summit West, Deep Learning Summit (February 15-16, 2023 / San Francisco, CA), a chance to hear the latest technology advancements, practical examples of how to apply AI to solve challenges in cross-industry settings, business and society, and delve deeper into the work of leading AI experts in a series of presentations, panel discussions, interviews and fireside chats.

  3. Data Science Salon Austin (February 21-22, 2023 / Austin, TX + Virtual) is a two-day 500-person conference focused on AI and machine learning applications in the enterprise. The intimate event curates data science sessions to bring industry leaders and specialists face-to-face to educate each other on innovative new solutions in artificial intelligence, machine learning, predictive analytics and acceptance around best practices.

 💼 Jobs

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