Nvidia announced that it would build Britain’s most powerful supercomputer. The company will invest around $52m on the “Cambridge-1” supercomputer, which will comprise of 80 Nvidia systems and focus on AI research in health and medical care, including COVID-19 challenges. It's expected to come online this year.

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• Nvidia founder and CEO Jensen Huang revealed the plans at the company’s GTC 2020 conference on Monday. He said that addressing the greatest challenges in healthcare "requires massively powerful computing resources to harness the capabilities of AI."
• Cambridge-1 would rank as the U.K.'s most powerful supercomputer and the world’s 29th most powerful, as well as among the top three most energy-efficient supercomputers worldwide. It will be built on the Nvidia DGX SuperPOD system, capable of processing 400 petaflops of AI performance and 8 petaflops of Linpack performance.
• Pharma companies GlaxoSmithKline and AstraZeneca and King’s College London are among those that have registered to use the supercomputer.
• It's the second Nvidia supercomputer in the U.K. The first is currently under development at Nvidia's research center in Cambridge, England.
• Cambridge-1 will also be based in the U.K. city, which is where Arm's headquarters are. Nvidia said last month it plans to acquire Arm for up to $40b. Cambridge-1 will be independent of Arm.

More Nvidia news:

• During the GTC keynote, Huang unveiled a $59 Jetson Nano 2GB, a single-board supercomputer geared toward those with an interest in AI and robotics. Nvidia said the developer kit, which includes online tutorials and certification, is designed to "make AI easily accessible for all."
• Nvidia also announced a new partnership with GSK to develop AI-based computational processes for drug discovery and new vaccines. GSK will be able to use the new supercomputer and other AI methods to uncover new clinical and medical data and information.
• Huang and Arm CEO Simon Segars will also hold a keynote chat at tomorrow's digital Arm DevSummit.

Nvidia introduced Maxine, a videoconferencing platform for developers that can remove background noise, upscale resolution, reorientate the camera, and replace faces with AI avatars. The AI-powered suite of tools will boost video call quality and process calls in the cloud using Nvidia’s GPUs.

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• Maxine features also include real-time translation and transcription via Nvidia Jarvis, face re-lighting, and face alignment to ensure you’re always looking at the camera,
• It can reduce video's bandwidth requirement down to a tenth of the H.264 streaming video compression standard requirements by using AI to analyze and transmit “key facial points" only.
• Nvidia’s face-alignment features appear to be a "more extreme version" of Microsoft and Apple's gaze-alignment in the Surface Pro X and FaceTime. Maxine could help improve some of the features already available on Skype, Zoom, Microsoft Teams, and Google Meet.
• Developers can sign up for early access to integrate Maxine into their respective platforms.

New funding for AI/ML startups

• XtalPi (US/China), AI-assisted drug discovery platform: $319M C led by SoftBank Vision Fund.
• Cogniac (San Jose, CA), AI image and video analysis platform: $10M B led by Autotech Ventures, participation from Vanedge Capital, Wing Venture Capital, Yellowstone Ventures, The George Kaiser Family Foundation/Energy Innovation Capital.
• Datasaur (Sunnyvale, CA), machine learning label team assistance platform: $3.9M from Initialized Capital, Y Combinator, Greg Brockman...

India and its allies must protect the world against AI weaponization by "non-state actors," Prime Minister Narendra Modi said today. Modi said algorithm transparency is key for trust in AI, and many Indians are already working to make the country a "global hub for AI."

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• Modi made the comments on the first of a five-day global AI summit, known as Raise 2020, that's focused on responsible AI for social development.
• AI has many benefits including the creation of next-gen urban infrastructure and better disaster management systems, Modi said. He still stressed that "human creativity and human emotions" give us an advantage over AI/machines.
• Modi announced the formation of the National Educational Technology Forum, a re-education unit focused on digital innovation, and the Responsible AI for Youth program, where 11,000 students were taught about AI basics are now building AI projects.
• India is a member of the Global Partnership on Artificial Intelligence, a global responsible AI group, along with the U.S., U.K. Australia, Canada, France, Germany, New Zealand, and others. It launched earlier this year.

An interactive AI tool purports to measure a person's attractiveness, BMI, and age. The "How Normal Am I?" website and mini-documentary, now accessible online, is meant to shed light on the problems inherent with facial recognition technology.

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• The website comes from privacy designer and tech critic Tijmen Schep.
• To try it out, users have to grant website permission for webcam access. The project scans a person's face to predict and measure their features. It doesn't collect personal data.
• It's part of the European Union-funded project SHERPA, which "analyzes how AI and big data analytics impact ethics and human rights."
• The EU currently lacks laws regulating facial recognition tech on a grand scale. The tech is show to be biased against African-American and Asian faces.

GM said that the rollout of its Cruise Origin autonomous vehicle is on track for 2021. GM’s VP of electrified and autonomous vehicles, Ken Morris, said the pandemic has not delayed the development of the vehicle, which is currently being tested at the automaker’s Milford track. Morris expects pre-production vehicles ready by 2021.

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• The automaker first showed off the driverless Origin vehicle, which is intended for ride-hailing purposes, in January. The COVID-19 outbreak initially sidelined the fleet of vehicles, which are tested to help develop Cruise’s AI platform, but later brought them back for meal deliveries.
• The vehicle will use Cruise Automation’s autonomous driving technology, which is currently being tested on Chevrolet Bolt vehicles in San Francisco.
• General Motors acquired the autonomous-driving startup Cruise Automation for $1b in 2016. Last year, it was reported that Cruise was struggling to refine its self-driving car technology. The company still raised a $1.15b investment in May 2019.

A version of this story first appeared in Inside Transportation.

QUICK HITS

• A Cal Poly professor and University of Florida professor released a report to guide researchers and policymakers in AI predictive policing.
• TechTalks reviewed futurist Amy Webb's book, "The Big Nine: How the Tech Titans and Their Thinking Machines Could Warp Humanity," which argues that tech giants aren't to blame for AI's current problems but solutions are needed.
• A Tesla hacker found driver monitoring parameters that will be used by the Model 3’s interior camera. Some of the parameters show the camera, in combination with the vehicle’s AI system, can allow for more advanced driver monitoring.
• Lyft has reportedly discussed a self-driving vehicle partnership with auto supplier Bosch. 
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Tweet of the Day: Asier Arranz, who previously led IBM's Quantum Community Lab, has moved into a position at Nvidia AI.