This strategic move aims to make generative AI accessible to organisations of all sizes, allowing them to develop, possess, and safeguard their own generative AI models using their own data. 

The acquisition, valued at ~$1.3 billion – inclusive of retention packages – showcases Databricks’ commitment to democratising AI and reinforcing the company’s Lakehouse platform as a leading environment for building generative AI and LLMs.

Naveen Rao, Co-Founder and CEO at MosaicML, said:

“At MosaicML, we believe in a world where everyone is empowered to build and train their own models, imbued with their own opinions and viewpoints — and joining forces with Databricks will help us make that belief a reality.

We started MosaicML to solve the hard engineering and research problems necessary to make large-scale training more accessible to everyone. With the recent generative AI wave, this mission has taken centre stage.

Together with Databricks, we will tip the scales in the favour of many — and we’ll do it as kindred spirits: researchers turned entrepreneurs sharing a similar mission. We look forward to continuing this journey together with the AI community.”

MosaicML has gained recognition for its cutting-edge MPT large language models, with millions of downloads for MPT-7B and the recent release of MPT-30B.

The platform has demonstrated how organisations can swiftly construct and train their own state-of-the-art models cost-effectively by utilising their own data. Esteemed customers like AI2, Generally Intelligent, Hippocratic AI, Replit, and Scatter Labs have leveraged MosaicML for a diverse range of generative AI applications.

The primary objective of this acquisition is to provide organisations with a simple and rapid method to develop, own, and secure their models. By combining the capabilities of Databricks’ Lakehouse Platform with MosaicML’s technology, customers can maintain control, security, and ownership of their valuable data without incurring exorbitant costs.

MosaicML’s automatic optimisation of model training enables 2x-7x faster training compared to standard approaches, and the near linear scaling of resources allows for the training of multi-billion-parameter models within hours. Consequently, Databricks and MosaicML aim to reduce the cost of training and utilising LLMs from millions to thousands of dollars.

The integration of Databricks’ unified Data and AI platform with MosaicML’s generative AI training capabilities will result in a robust and flexible platform capable of serving the largest organisations and addressing various AI use cases.

Upon the completion of the transaction, the entire MosaicML team – including its renowned research team – is expected to join Databricks.

MosaicML’s machine learning and neural networks experts are at the forefront of AI research, striving to enhance model training efficiency. They have contributed to popular open-source foundational models like MPT-30B, as well as the training algorithms powering MosaicML’s products.

The MosaicML platform will be progressively supported, scaled, and integrated to provide customers with a seamless unified platform where they can build, own, and secure their generative AI models. The partnership between Databricks and MosaicML empowers customers with the freedom to construct their own models, train them using their unique data, and develop differentiating intellectual property for their businesses.

The completion of the proposed acquisition is subject to customary closing conditions, including regulatory clearances.

(Photo by Glen Carrie on Unsplash)

See also: MosaicML’s latest models outperform GPT-3 with just 30B parameters

Want to learn more about AI and big data from industry leaders? Check out AI & Big Data Expo taking place in Amsterdam, California, and London. The event is co-located with Digital Transformation Week.

The post Databricks acquires LLM pioneer MosaicML for $1.3B appeared first on AI News.

The deal caught the attention of global regulators with anti-competition investigations launched in several jurisdictions including the UK, EU, and US.

In November 2021, UK Digital Secretary Nadine Dorries decided to block the merger pending the results of a 24-week ‘Phase 2’ investigation.

With the merger looking almost impossible to be approved by regulators, Nvidia has decided to throw in the towel.

Jensen Huang, Founder and CEO of Nvidia, said:

“Arm has a bright future, and we’ll continue to support them as a proud licensee for decades to come.

Arm is at the centre of the important dynamics in computing. Though we won’t be one company, we will partner closely with Arm.

The significant investments that Masa has made have positioned Arm to expand the reach of the Arm CPU beyond client computing to supercomputing, cloud, AI, and robotics.

I expect Arm to be the most important CPU architecture of the next decade.”

Arm has struggled from relatively flat revenues and rising costs despite the huge success of the company’s licensees such as Apple, Qualcomm, and Amazon.

SoftBank, Arm’s current owner, considered and subsequently rejected the idea of pursuing an IPO (Initial Public Offering) of the company in 2019 and again in early 2020.

“We contemplated an IPO but determined that the pressure to deliver short-term revenue growth and profitability would suffocate our ability to invest, expand, move fast, and innovate,” explained Simon Segars, CEO of Arm, last month.

Following the collapse of the Nvidia acquisition, Softbank will now have to reconsider an IPO for Arm.

Dr Lil Read, Analyst in the Thematic Research Team at GlobalData, commented:

“Softbank now needs to think of Arm’s future. An initial public offering (IPO) looks likely – the UK government would surely like to see the home-grown chip designer float in London, and potential IPO reforms could create the perfect environment for this. 

Otherwise, Arm may be ripe for a takeover by a private equity consortium backed by chip-friendly giants such as Apple, Qualcomm, and TSMC – Arm’s largest customers.”

Some of Nvidia’s rivals are said to have offered to invest in Arm if it helps the company to remain independent. A takeover from a private equity consortium looks to be Arm’s best option. If the company has to launch an IPO, it could struggle and will face some difficult choices.

Arm’s largest market, mobile, is saturated. The company will struggle to crack the datacentre and PC markets in the face of strong incumbents like Intel and AMD that have established ecosystem of developers, software, systems, and peripherals, and profits that enable them to make large R&D investments.

In an earlier response to the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority, aiming to quell the regulator’s fears about its acquisition of Arm, Nvidia wrote:

“Nvidia is particularly concerned that these pressures would drive Arm to deprioritize datacenter and PC and to instead focus on its core mobile and growing IoT businesses.

The result would be a concentrated CPU market largely controlled by Intel/AMD (x86).”

Capital markets would likely expect Arm to cut costs to maximise the company’s value. However, SoftBank sounds bullish on its prospects.

“Arm is becoming a centre of innovation not only in the mobile phone revolution, but also in cloud computing, automotive, the Internet of Things, and the metaverse, and has entered its second growth phase,” said Masayoshi Son, Representative Director, Corporate Officer, Chairman, and CEO of SoftBank Group.

Arm has announced a management shake-up in the wake of Nvidia’s exit from the deal.

Rene Haas, the former head of Arm’s intellectual property unit, will take over as the company’s chief executive and lead it during these challenging times. Haas previously worked at Nvidia for seven years.

With the Nvidia acquisition off the table, we can only hope that Haas finds a way to ensure Arm can continue to deliver the semiconductor innovation that it has for three decades.

(Photo by Dustin Tramel on Unsplash)

Want to learn more about AI and big data from industry leaders? Check out AI & Big Data Expo. The next events in the series will be held in Santa Clara on 11-12 May 2022, Amsterdam on 20-21 September 2022, and London on 1-2 December 2022.

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Nvidia announced plans to acquire Cambridge-based Arm back in September 2020 in a deal worth $40 billion. As two of the biggest names in chip manufacturing, the deal naturally caught the attention of competition regulators around the world.

In November 2021, UK Digital Secretary Nadine Dorries decided to block the merger pending the results of a 24-week ‘Phase 2’ investigation.

Wouldn’t an IPO be an alternative to all of this?

Arm has been struggling from relatively flat revenues and rising costs despite the huge success of the company’s licensees such as Apple, Qualcomm, and Amazon. Arm’s current owner, SoftBank, considered and subsequently rejected the idea of pursuing an IPO (Initial Public Offering) of the company in 2019 and again in early 2020.

Simon Segars, CEO of Arm, explained: “We contemplated an IPO but determined that the pressure to deliver short-term revenue growth and profitability would suffocate our ability to invest, expand, move fast, and innovate.”

In addition, Arm’s largest market, mobile, is saturated and it could be difficult for Arm to crack the datacentre and PC markets in the face of strong incumbents like Intel and AMD that have established ecosystem of developers, software, systems, and peripherals, and profits that enable them to make large R&D investments.

“These observations are not criticisms of Arm’s technology or engineering team. Arm has great engineering talent in the areas where it focuses. But as a standalone IP licensing business, and without access to further capital, Arm has inherent scale, scope, and economic limitations that would impact Arm’s future as a standalone licensing firm,” reads the response.

Addressing competition concerns

Nvidia believes that its acquisition would provide Arm with the resources to move forward in the face of limited options. Capital markets. meanwhile, would expect Arm to cut costs to maximise the company’s value.

“Nvidia is particularly concerned that these pressures would drive Arm to deprioritize datacenter and PC and to instead focus on its core mobile and growing IoT businesses. The result would be a concentrated CPU market largely controlled by Intel/AMD (x86),” the response continues.

The company goes on to say that soaring profits for Arm’s customers are not a win for the company or for competition. Nvidia argues the “industry titans will be powerful and competitive, no matter what path Arm takes” and “the question at hand is whether regulators will approve the transaction and allow Arm to take the steps needed to enable others to compete.”

Nvidia highlights that it was SoftBank that approached the company about the potential of acquiring Arm rather than the other way around. Nvidia says it will continue to support x86 as it has a vested interest – building platforms such as Omniverse on such systems – but thinks that it can help Arm build a viable alternative ecosystem that will increase options and encourage the x86 giants to innovate.

Arm’s future as a British tech icon

From the UK’s perspective, another major concern was the impact on jobs and even the company’s future in the country. Hermann Hauser, the founder of Arm, once suggested the acquisition would be “surrendering the UK’s most powerful trade weapon to the US”.

In a binding offer, Nvidia committed to expanding Arm’s engineering teams in the UK—including a pledge to create a new group dedicated to creating purpose-built CPU IP for datacentres and PCs.

Nvidia chose to build its Cambridge-1 supercomputer in the UK, which was seen by many as a bid to show its commitment to the country. The firm also opened a new AI centre in Cambridge—home to an increasing number of exciting startups in the field such as FiveAI, Prowler.io, Fetch.ai, and Darktrace.

“We will create an open centre of excellence in the area once home to giants like Isaac Newton and Alan Turing, for whom key Nvidia technologies are named,” said Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang at the time.

“Here, leading scientists, engineers and researchers from the UK and around the world will come to develop their ideas, collaborate and conduct their ground-breaking work in areas like healthcare, life sciences, self-driving cars, and other fields.”

No incentive to foreclose

The final major concern around the acquisition is that the merged entities will refuse or restrict the licensing of future IP to give Nvidia a competitive advantage.

Nvidia points to the emergence of RISC-V and other alternatives to Arm that could become preferable “if the Merged Entity were to refuse to license future datacenter IP as soon as it can”. However, it says that would be many years down the road as “customers already have the IP in their possession, and it will be many years before their contracts are up for renewal”.

Furthermore, Nvidia says that it would have no economic incentive to foreclose:

“NVIDIA knows that such a strategy would be self-defeating, and has no incentive to pursue it. The Decision does not explain why any downstream customer would embrace a sole-source ecosystem. Even x86 has always had two bona fide suppliers (Intel and AMD), and now, x86 is licensable to anyone.”

It also says that Arm’s customers are Nvidia’s customers and any attempt to foreclose would damage its own business and reputation.

While regulators have been mulling whether or not to approve the deal, Nvidia says that Arm’s competition has been exploiting the delay to continue expanding their offerings.

Nvidia makes some fairly solid arguments in its response, but whether they’re enough to woo regulators is another question. It’s not just the UK’s regulator examining the deal, but also respective agencies from the US, China, and EU.

(Photo by Mika Baumeister on Unsplash)

Want to learn more about AI and big data from industry leaders? Check out AI & Big Data Expo. The next events in the series will be held in Santa Clara on 11-12 May 2022, Amsterdam on 20-21 September 2022, and London on 1-2 December 2022.

Explore other upcoming enterprise technology events and webinars powered by TechForge here.

The post Nvidia attempts to alleviate Arm merger concerns in CMA response appeared first on AI News.

Nuance gained renown for originally creating the backend of that little old virtual assistant called Siri (you might have heard of it?)

The company has since continued to focus on building its speech recognition capabilities and has a number of solutions which span particular industries such as healthcare to general omni-channel customer experience services.

Earlier this year, Microsoft decided Nuance is worth coughing up $19.7 billion for.

As such large deals often do, the proposed acquisition caught the eyes of several global regulators. In the case of the EU, it was referred to the Commission’s regulators on 16 November.

The regulator said on Tuesday that the proposed acquisition “would raise no competition concerns” within the bloc and that “Microsoft and Nuance offer very different products” after looking at potential horizontal overlaps between the companies’ transcription solutions.

Vertical links in the healthcare space were also analysed but it was determined that “competing transcription service providers in healthcare do not depend on Microsoft for cloud computing services” and that “transcription service providers in the healthcare sector are not particularly important users of cloud computing services”.

Furthermore, the regulator concluded:

• Microsoft-Nuance will continue to face stiff competition from rivals in the future.
• There’d be no ability/incentive to foreclose existing market solutions.
• Nuance can only use the data it collects for its own services.
• The data will not provide Microsoft with an advantage to shut out competing software providers.

The EU’s decision mirrors that of regulators in the US and Australia. However, the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) announced its own investigation earlier this month.

When it announced the deal, Microsoft said that it aims to complete its acquisition by the end of 2021. The CMA is accepting comments until 10 January 2022 so it seems that Microsoft may have to hold out a bit longer.

(Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash)

Want to learn more about AI and big data from industry leaders? Check out AI & Big Data Expo. The next events in the series will be held in Santa Clara on 11-12 May 2022, Amsterdam on 20-21 September 2022, and London on 1-2 December 2022.

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Arm plays a critical role in the global technology supply chain with its designs used for edge AI chips and processors for smartphones, tablets, desktops, and servers.

It’s of little surprise that Nvidia wants to bring Arm under its wing and is willing to pay $40 billion (£29 billion) for it.

Global regulators, including in the UK and EU, have launched investigations into the deal due to the widespread implications.

Holly Vedova, Director of the Bureau of Competition at the FTC, said in a statement:

“The FTC is suing to block the largest semiconductor chip merger in history to prevent a chip conglomerate from stifling the innovation pipeline for next-generation technologies.

Tomorrow’s technologies depend on preserving today’s competitive, cutting-edge chip markets. This proposed deal would distort Arm’s incentives in chip markets and allow the combined firm to unfairly undermine Nvidia’s rivals.

The FTC’s lawsuit should send a strong signal that we will act aggressively to protect our critical infrastructure markets from illegal vertical mergers that have far-reaching and damaging effects on future innovations.”

The complaint highlights that Nvidia already uses Arm’s designs for areas including DPU SmartNICs, CPUs for cloud computing, and advanced driving systems. The FTC is concerned that Nvidia would have an incentive to use its acquisition of Arm to limit competitors’ access to new designs.

Some of Nvidia’s rivals have offered to invest in Arm if it helps the company to remain independent.

Dr Lil Read, Analyst at GlobalData, commented:

“The Nvidia-ARM deal is on its last legs. The regulatory environment is much tougher now since Qualcomm has formed a consortium to invest in ARM.

The FTC won’t let it be – nor will the UK CMA or the EU regulator. It’s likely that even if the deal managed to clear those hurdles, Chinese regulators would throw another spanner in the works.

Tying the acquisition up for another two years is not in anyone’s interest – not Nvidia’s, and certainly not ARM’s. There could be hope for ARM if a non-chip firm recognises this opportunity for vertical integration – a trend that we increasingly see with the likes of Tesla and Apple.”

Arm founder Hermann Hauser even suggested the merger would amount to “surrendering the UK’s most powerful trade weapon to the US”.

Last month, UK Digital Secretary Nadine Dorries ordered the CMA (Competition & Markets Authority) to launch a “Phase Two” probe into the proposed merger.

As part of its ‘Phase One’ report, the CMA determined the merger has the possibility of a “substantial lessening of competition across four key markets”. Those markets are data centres, the Internet of Things, automotive, and gaming.

The CMA now has 24 weeks to conduct Phase Two of its investigation.

Nvidia, for its part, has promised to work with UK regulators to alleviate concerns. The company has already pledged to keep Arm in the UK and hire more staff.

“Arm is an incredible company and it employs some of the greatest engineering minds in the world,” said Jensen Huang, CEO of Nvidia. “But we believe we can make Arm even more incredible and take it to even higher levels.”

Today’s decision by the FTC to launch a lawsuit makes the likelihood of the merger proceeding ever more remote.

(Photo by NordWood Themes on Unsplash)

Want to learn more about AI and big data from industry leaders? Check out AI & Big Data Expo North America on 11-12 May 2022.

The post FTC steps in to block Nvidia’s $40B acquisition of Arm appeared first on AI News.

Nvidia has put in a $40 billion offer to acquire Cambridge-based Arm, which designs a large proportion of the chips that end up in devices.

“AI is the most powerful technology force of our time and has launched a new wave of computing,” said Jensen Huang, founder and CEO of NVIDIA, when the acquisition was announced.

“In the years ahead, trillions of computers running AI will create a new internet-of-things that is thousands of times larger than today’s internet-of-people. Our combination will create a company fabulously positioned for the age of AI.”

While the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority decided in August that the deal “raises serious competition concerns”, it’s taken until this week for the European Commission to launch its own investigation.

Both regulators are in agreement that Nvidia could make business very difficult for its competitors by charging higher royalties or withholding rights to some of Arm’s designs.

European Commission Executive Vice-President Margrethe Vestager, responsible for competition policy, said: 

“Semiconductors are everywhere in products and devices that we use every day as well as in infrastructure such as datacentres.

Whilst Arm and NVIDIA do not directly compete, Arm’s IP is an important input in products competing with those of NVIDIA, for example in datacentres, automotive, and in the Internet of Things.

Our analysis shows that the acquisition of Arm by NVIDIA could lead to restricted or degraded access to Arm’s IP, with distortive effects in many markets where semiconductors are used.

Our investigation aims to ensure that companies active in Europe continue having effective access to the technology that is necessary to produce state-of-the-art semiconductor products at competitive prices.”

The Commission says it will also investigate the potential impact of Arm’s R&D spending being refocused on products that are most profitable for Nvidia, at the detriment of competitors relying on Arm IP elsewhere.

Nvidia submitted commitments to the European Commission on 6 October 2021 to address some of the initial concerns, but the Commission deemed them insufficient.

“We are working closely with the European Commission through the regulatory process,” said an Nvidia spokesperson. “We look forward to the opportunity to address their initial concerns and continue demonstrating that the transaction will help to accelerate Arm and boost competition and innovation, including in the EU.”

In the UK, Nvidia has made several promises in a bid to woo regulators—including pledging to keep the business in the UK and hire more staff.

Nvidia also recently announced a new AI centre in Cambridge – home to an increasing number of leading startups in the field such as FiveAI, Prowler.io, Fetch.ai, and Darktrace – that features an Arm/Nvidia-based supercomputer, set to be one of the most powerful in the world. Nvidia says the centre demonstrates its commitment to the UK.

However, Arm founder Hermann Hauser recently warned that “surrendering the UK’s most powerful trade weapon to the US” would be “making Britain a US vassal state”.

The CMA, for its part, reports that it’s received a “substantial number” of concerns from Nvidia’s competitors. Some of Nvidia’s rivals have even offered to invest in Arm if it helps the company to remain independent.

The European Commission now has until 15 March 2022 to approve or reject the deal.

(Photo by Sara Kurfeß on Unsplash)

Find out more about Digital Transformation Week North America, taking place on 9-10 November 2021, a virtual event and conference exploring advanced DTX strategies for a ‘digital everything’ world.

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Laserlike is known for its AI-powered app which makes it easier for users to follow news topics. Most notably, it was founded by former Google engineers.

Few people think of Apple as an AI leader. The firm’s closest rival, Google, has invested heavily in AI for many years (as much for its cloud and search businesses as mobile).

Apple is, therefore, coming from a position behind in terms of AI development. However, it is quickly catching up through hoovering up talented AI companies and solutions. Let’s all remember, even Siri was acquired from Nuance.

Here are some of the other AI companies Apple has acquired in the past few years:

• Silk Labs (2018)
• Asaii (2018)
• Spektral (2017)
• Regains (2017)

Following the poaching of Google’s John Giannandrea, it’s been clear that Apple has been doubling-down on its AI efforts. Which makes sense, if you’re here on AI News then you know how important it is for Apple to become a leader in the space.

On its website, Laserlike pledges to keep personalisation at its core post-Apple acquisition:

“This is one of the things we want to fix on the Internet. Laserlike’s core mission is to deliver high quality information and diverse perspectives on any topic from the entire web. We are passionate about helping people follow their interests and engage with new perspectives.”

Apple is holding an event on March 25th where it’s rumoured to be launching a news subscription service. It will be interesting to see if this acquisition plays a part.

Interested in hearing industry leaders discuss subjects like this and their use cases? Attend the co-located AI & Big Data Expo events with upcoming shows in Silicon Valley, London, and Amsterdam to learn more. Co-located with the IoT Tech Expo, Blockchain Expo, and Cyber Security & Cloud Expo.

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