NEWS YOU CAN’T MISS

Dubai announces “1 Million Prompters” AI initiative

Prompt engineering is the hottest new skill in the job market, and Dubai is taking notice.

The city recently launched "One Million Prompters," an ambitious initiative to train one million individuals in the art of effectively communicating with AI agents.

Why should you care?

Because it's becoming an in-demand job skill. LinkedIn members are rapidly adding AI skills to their profiles, with a 142-fold increase compared to last year, according to Microsoft and LinkedIn's 2024 Work Trend Index.

So, what exactly is an AI prompter? Prompt engineers are experts in crafting precise instructions (prompts) that guide AI models to generate accurate and useful responses.

To be a successful prompt engineer, you don't need to be an AI expert or know how to code. What you do need is a combination of:

• Domain Knowledge: Understanding specific industries or subjects is beneficial depending on the application. For instance, medical knowledge would be valuable for a prompt engineer working on healthcare applications.

• Communication Skills: The ability to express instructions clearly and concisely is crucial for eliciting desired results from AI models. Analyzing problems, breaking them down, and formulating effective prompts are key skills.

• Critical Thinking: Prompt engineers must prioritize safety and ethics by carefully evaluating potential biases, risks, and ethical implications in AI outputs to ensure responsible AI development and usage.

As someone deeply invested in the AI space, I can confidently say that prompt engineering skills are non-negotiable. I'm personally committed to mastering them, and I believe you should be too.

Musk's xAI Secures $6B to Take on ChatGPT

Elon Musk's AI startup xAI has raised a staggering $6 billion in a Series B funding round, marking one of the largest investments in the AI industry to date. In case you missed it, between Tesla, X (formerly known as Twitter), SpaceX and Neuralink, Musk also launched xAI in July last year.

This massive funding round, led by prominent VCs like Andreessen Horowitz and Sequoia Capital and Saudi’s Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal, underscores Musk's ambition to challenge his former allies at OpenAI, the creators of ChatGPT. With a valuation of $24 billion, xAI is now a formidable competitor in the rapidly evolving AI landscape.

A significant portion of the funds will go towards building a massive supercomputer dubbed the "Gigafactory of Compute." This unprecedented computing behemoth, projected to be ready by fall 2025, will be at least four times larger than the current largest GPU clusters of companies like Meta and will be critical in training xAI’s next versions of its conversational AI.

Musk does not shy away from his views on the power of AI, its rapid progress and its risk, recently tweeting, "AI will probably be smarter than any single human next year,” adding at Paris last week, “Probably none of us will have a job” eventually.

Looks like investors believe him.

Google's AI: A Tale of Two Algorithms

I'm conflicted about AI. I'm the CEO of an AI services firm. I have over 15 years of experience advising some of the world's largest companies on machine learning and AI. I am an AI enthusiast and optimist.

But Google also recently launched Overview AI, its new generative AI-powered search which returns answers rather than a list of websites. But users have been sharing bizarre examples like Overview AI recommending humans consume “at least one small rock a day” to get our minerals and vitamins.

On the surface, these wrong results may sound funny, but what if a child searched for whether they should eat a rock and believed what the AI said? What if it recommended something much more harmful? A misguided roll-out. 

Generative AI was used in both instances, but governance, testing, and patience seemed to guide one more than the other. Governance is the only way to deploy AI responsibly. No company should rush to roll out pilots to millions of users out of competitive pressure.

So I guess I’m ok being of two minds about AI. When it comes to AI, I'd rather be conflicted than complacent.

WOMEN IN AI

Meet Raquel Urtasun, founder and CEO of Waabi

Raquel Urtasun is a globally recognized authority in the field of AI for autonomous vehicles.

Urtasun founded Waabi in 2021 with the ambitious goal of developing next-generation technology for self-driving vehicles, particularly for the trucking industry, securing $84 million in funding from top investors like Khosla Ventures, Aurora, and Uber.

Waabi established key partnerships with companies like Volvo Group, Uber Freight, and MIT Center for Transportation & Logistics and was featured in prestigious lists like Forbes' AI 50.

Urtasun’s journey began in Spain, where she hails from a working-class family in Pamplona and was encouraged by her parents to pursue science. She completed her bachelor's degree from the Universidad Publica de Navarra and her Ph.D. in computer science from EPFL in Switzerland.

Today she is a Full Professor at University of Toronto. She also co-founded the Vector Institute for AI in 2017, a leading AI research institute in Canada.

Prior to founding Waabi, Urtasun spent four years at Uber (2017-2021) as the Chief Scientist and Head of R&D for Uber's self-driving vehicle division, Uber ATG.

She is the recipient of many awards including:

• Appointed to the Order of Ontario for 2023

• Featured in Time's The 100 Most Influential People in AI 2023 list

• Recipient of the NVIDIA Pioneers of AI Award in 2022

In March, Waabi recently unveiled Copilot4D, a pioneering AI model that understands and operates in 3D environments. According to Urtasun, “Similar to how large language models learn by predicting the next word in a sentence, Copilot4D learns by predicting how a machine will perceive the world in the future through its LiDAR sensors.”

Fun Fact: "Waabi" means "beauty of simplicity" in Japanese and "she has vision" in Ojibwe, perfectly capturing Urtasun's goal of simplifying autonomous vehicles through her startup.

ENTERPRISE AI CASE STUDY

Klarna Slashes Marketing Spend by 25% with AI

Industry: Marketing

Klarna, a leading global fintech company specializing in "buy now, pay later" (BNPL) services and online financial solutions, announced it cut marketing agency spend by 25% by using AI in different ways.

In Q1 2024, Klarna reduced its sales and marketing spend by 11% while increasing campaign frequency and updating marketing materials more often.

AI contributed to 37% cost savings or approximately $10 million on annual basis. Key cost reductions include a 25% cut in external agency expenses, saving $4 million, and a $6 million reduction in image production costs using Gen AI tools like Midjourney and DALL-E.

Klarna’s Gen AI tools produced over 1,000 images in three months, cutting the development cycle from 6 weeks to 7 days. AI also handles 80% of Klarna's copywriting, supported by over 300 internal GPTs developed in partnership with OpenAI.

LEARN, CONNECT AND GROW

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