By Suzanne Fallender

In light of COVID-19, the need for corporations to take a collaborative approach to solve the world’s greatest challenges has never been more apparent. This is especially true for technology companies as data and information play a crucial role in helping to track, diagnose and treat this pandemic, and will continue to do so as we look to get ahead of future global challenges.

More: Intel Launches First Global Challenges, Marks a New Era of Shared Corporate Responsibility

Intel has a long history of integrating corporate responsibility efforts into our operations, and it’s hard to believe that nearly 10 years have passed since we developed our 2020 corporate responsibility goals. I am pleased to share that we achieved nearly all of them. Our latest Corporate Responsibility Report details our efforts, but there are a few accomplishments I’d like to highlight:

• Addressing climate change and sustainable water use are priorities for Intel given the energy and water intensity of semiconductor manufacturing. The United Nations reports that climate change is affecting every country on Earth — disrupting economies and changing weather patterns; and greenhouse gas emissions are at their highest levels. The UN also reports it is impacting our water, resulting in unpredictable supply, impaired quality and depleted sources. Some of the ways we have addressed climate change are by increasing our use of green power to 71% globally and reducing our direct carbon emissions by 39% on an intensity basis from a 2010 baseline. Since 2000, we have reduced our Scope 1 and 2 emissions 31% on an absolute basis1, even as we significantly expanded our manufacturing capacity. We also exceeded our goal to reduce our water use below 2010 levels on an intensity basis2, achieving a 38% decrease. In partnership with environmental nonprofit organizations, we restored 1 billion gallons of water to local watersheds.
• Advancing inclusion is core to our culture and essential to innovation. A recent Gartner survey found that 85% of diversity and inclusion leaders cited organizational inclusion as the most important talent outcome of their efforts, yet only 57% of organizations are currently using that metric to track progress. We set ambitious 2020 goals and committed $300 million to accelerate progress at Intel and across the technology industry. We reached full representation3 in our U.S. workforce for women and underrepresented minorities two years ahead of schedule as well as global gender pay equity. We also met our goal to increase annual spending with diverse suppliers to $1 billion and reached 5 million women through our technology empowerment programs.

I am proud of what we accomplished, but the world has changed significantly since we set the original goals. We need integrated corporate responsibility strategies in which companies use collaborative models to drive increased value creation and societal impact. The current pandemic has brought these new approaches into sharper focus as the challenges we face are simply too complex to be solved by any single organization.

With this in mind, we launched an integrated approach to create our 2030 goals and strategy. In order to drive a companywide mindset for corporate responsibility, we are leveraging the expertise and skills of many employees across multiple departments and regions. We also integrated input from external stakeholders, including our customers, investors, suppliers and community members, to ensure partnership and collaboration are at the heart of our work.

The result is Intel’s new RISE strategy and 2030 goals. Through this strategy, we strive to create a more responsible, inclusive and sustainable future, enabled through our technology and the expertise and passion of our employees. We will extend our impact by partnering with others in the technology industry and beyond, including government, NGOs and policymakers, to tackle key global challenges. Our RISE strategy is:

• Lead in advancing safety, wellness and responsible business practices across our global manufacturing operations, our value chain and beyond. One of our new goals in this area will scale our supply chain responsibility programs to 100% of our Tier 1 contracted suppliers and higher-risk Tier 2 suppliers, helping us to positively impact the lives of more people in the global supply chain. We will also work across our industry to leverage our best-known methods from our work on conflict minerals to extend responsible minerals sourcing across a wider range of materials to advance respect for human rights.
• Inclusive. Advance diversity and inclusion across our global workforce and industry, and expand opportunities for others through technology inclusion and digital readiness initiatives. As we look to 2030, we will increase women in technical roles to 40% and double the number of women and underrepresented minorities in senior leadership. We will also collaborate with our industry to create and implement a Global Inclusion Index. The Index will provide common definitions and data to clearly identify root causes and actions needed to collectively advance progress and build the future pipeline of talent.
• Sustainable. Be a global leader in sustainability and enable our customers and others to reduce their environmental impact through our actions and technology. With our new goals, we challenge ourselves to achieve net positive water use, 100% renewable power, zero total waste to landfills and additional absolute carbon emissions reductions, even as we grow. We will also launch collaborative initiatives to drive additional carbon emissions reductions and sustainable chemistry practices across our industry.

Today marks the beginning of a new era for corporate responsibility at Intel. We stand ready to work with others on our key global challenges to revolutionize how technology will improve health and safety, make technology fully inclusive and expand digital readiness, and achieve carbon neutral computing. We’ll drive to even higher levels of integration and collaboration to build more value for our stakeholders and deliver on our purpose to create world-changing technology that enriches the lives of every person on Earth.

I invite you to learn more about our accomplishments and goals, and how you can join us at intel.com/responsibility.

Suzanne Fallender is director of Corporate Responsibility at Intel Corporation.

1Absolute basis refers to the total amount of emissions being emitted.

2Intensity basis refers to a normalized metric that compares the total emissions target relative to its economic output.

3Full representation means that Intel’s workforce now reflects the percentage of women and URMs available in the U.S. skilled labor market.

The post Closing Out a Decade of Corporate Responsibility Accomplishments and Creating Greater Impact for the Next Decade appeared first on Intel Newsroom.

What’s New: Intel today introduced its new 10th Gen Intel® Core™ vPro® processors, built to power the next generation of business computing innovation for the increasingly remote workforce. The new mobile and desktop PC processors deliver increased productivity improvements, connectivity, security features and remote manageability – all to empower IT to deliver amazing experiences, helping employees stay connected, more productive, more secure and in the flow with minimal interruptions.

“Built for business, the Intel vPro platform is a comprehensive PC foundation for performance, hardware-enhanced security, manageability and stability. With our new 10th Gen Intel Core vPro processors, we’ve enhanced that solid PC foundation to help tackle not only today’s challenges, but also those of future work environments across the PC lifecycle.”
– Stephanie Hallford, Intel vice president of the Client Computing Group and general manager of Business Client Platforms

Intel Corporation on May 13, 20202, introduced its 10th Gen Intel Core vPro processors. The family of processors is designed to power the next generation of business computing innovation for the increasingly remote workforce. New mobile and desktop PC processors deliver increased productivity improvements, connectivity, security features and remote manageability. (Credit: Intel Corporation)
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How it Enables the Modern Workforce: For more than a decade, the Intel vPro platform has empowered IT to help businesses, large and small, keep employees productive, help secure company assets and simplify fleet management. That dedication continues to expand through the latest Intel vPro® platform, powered by 10th Gen Intel Core vPro processors, to deliver uncompromised productivity, hardware-based security features and a foundation for computing innovation.

Systems powered by the latest Intel vPro processors give workers the business-class performance and responsiveness they need to be productive, plus integrated Wi-Fi 6 (Gig+) connectivity, which is the best Wi-Fi technology for video conferencing1; more reliable performance; and manageability technologies to address new and emerging challenges for IT and users. All of this can be delivered on a range of form factors: from sleek, powerful and modern devices based on Intel’s Project Athena innovation program to high-performing desktop designs.

“For more than a decade, Cisco and Intel have partnered to deliver an unrivaled wireless experience, helping to elevate Wi-Fi’s business relevance and impact,” said Matt MacPherson, Wireless CTO at Cisco. “This close partnership provides early and extensive testing that ensures, as new industry standards and innovations emerge, Cisco and Intel customers can quickly and confidently embrace the latest technology. We’re excited for customers to experience the more reliable connections, faster downloads and improved application performance of the new 10th Gen Intel Core vPro processors and Cisco’s latest Wi-Fi 6 certified access points.”

Improvements in this generation include:

• Up to 40% better overall application performance compared with a 3-year-old laptop2.
• Up to 36% better office productivity compared with a 3-year-old laptop3.
• Analyze and visualize data up to 44% faster compared with a 5-year-old desktop4.
• Nearly 3 times faster5 Gigabit speeds and improved performance in dense environments with integrated Intel® Wi-Fi 6 (Gig+) for the best Wi-Fi technology for video conferencing1.
• Rapid responsiveness, worry-free battery life and instant resume with Project Athena-based laptops.

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For Internet of Things (IoT) developers, 10th Gen Intel Core vPro processors and Intel® Xeon® W-1200E series based on the Intel vPro platform provide business-class performance, remote management and more – ideal for applications in retail, banking, hospitality, education, healthcare, manufacturing and more.

About Key Features and Capabilities: Additional new 10th Gen Intel Core vPro processor developments for enhanced security, lifecycle management and operational stability include:

A More Secure Foundation:

• Intel Hardware Shield provides built-in hardware-enhanced security features to help prevent cyber-attacks – now with advanced threat detection and extended below-the-OS protection features to help safeguard system memory critical resources.
• Intel Transparent Supply Chain helps enable the traceability and authenticity of PC components for greater peace of mind.

Modern Lifecycle Management:

• Intel® Active Management Technology and Intel® Endpoint Management Assistance can help businesses save time and money on deskside support, PC maintenance and employee downtime with remote manageability of devices, whether on-premises or in the cloud.

PCs built with the new 10th Gen Intel Core vPro mobile and desktop processors are expected to be available from PC manufacturers over the next several months.

More Context: Intel 10th Gen Core vPro Platform Product Brief | Intel 10th Gen Core vPro Processor Product Brief | Internet of Things Platform Brief | Intel Xeon W-1200 Workstation Processors Product Brief

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The Small Print:

All information provided here is subject to change without notice. Contact your Intel representative to obtain the latest Intel product specifications, roadmaps, and related information.

Testing concluded May 4, 2020, and may not reflect all publicly available updates. See configuration disclosure for details. No product can be absolutely secure.

Software and workloads used in performance tests may have been optimized for performance only on Intel microprocessors.

Performance tests, such as SYSmark and MobileMark, are measured using specific computer systems, components, software, operations and functions. Any change to any of those factors may cause the results to vary. You should consult other information and performance tests to assist you in fully evaluating your contemplated purchases, including the performance of that product when combined with other products. For more complete information about performance and benchmark results, visit http://www.intel.com/benchmarks

Your costs and results may vary.

Intel technologies may require enabled hardware, software or service activation.

Intel contributes to the development of benchmarks by participating in, sponsoring, and/or contributing technical support to various benchmarking groups, including the BenchmarkXPRT Development Community administered by Principled Technologies.

Battery life may vary substantially by use, system configurations, and settings. Among other things, battery life depends on the size and age of your battery, what your power settings are, how bright your screen is, what applications you are running, and whether you are using wireless or Bluetooth functions while mobile. Battery life also depends on system design, including the memory, processor, and operating system installed on your computer, and how your use your computer (e.g., playing a game or watching a video online consumes more power than word processing).  In addition, actual battery life may not match the theoretical battery life reported by a benchmark for other reasons as well. Benchmark testing is normally done on new computers with fully charged, properly conditioned batteries, yet batteries lose capacity over time and after repeated use.

1 As measured by by OTA (Over the Air) Wi-Fi 6 (802.11ax) vs. Wi-Fi 5 (802.11ac) NB client Skype video conferencing test data, obtained in standard corporate IT 20 MHz and 40 MHz network deployment scenarios.

Wi-Fi networks consist of 8 NB clients with 7 clients generating 10-20 Mbps Wi-Fi traffic (using iChariot traffic simulator) while 1 client conducts a 5 min Skype video conference session with a 9th client connected via 10/100/1000 Ethernet to a local server.  Skype data obtained via Skype reporting application.

8 NB Wi-Fi network client specifications: Dell XPS 13 (10th Gen), Killer AX1650, Driver 21.90.0.9; OS: Win 10 19H1 64-bit,  9th NB Callee (wired) = Dell G7 15 7588, Killer E2400, Driver: 9.0.0.42, OS: Win 10 19H1 64-bit; Enterprise APs: (AC) Wi-Fi 5: Cisco 3800, FW: 8.10.128.91;  (AX) Wi-Fi 6: Cisco 9130, FW: 8.10.128.91

Wi-Fi 6 performance benefits require use of similarly configured Wi-Fi 6 networking infrastructure (routers & APs) based on the IEEE 802.11ax wireless standard specification.

Test data represents best case results through a controlled local network to show relative Wi-Fi 6 vs. Wi-Fi 5 technology differences.  Actual real-world corporate results may vary and are expected to be higher due to 1) greater number of diverse clients, 2) higher network traffic levels, and 3) greater physical client distance from Skype server.

2 As measured by SYSmark 2018 Overall Score on pre-production 10th Gen Intel® Core™  i7-10810U vs. 8/15/19 testing of 7th Gen Intel® Core™ i7-7600U.

3 As measured by SYSmark 2018 Productivity Subtest Score on pre-production 10th Gen Intel® Core™  i7-10810U vs. 8/15/19 testing of 7th Gen Intel® Core™ i7-7600U.

4 As measured by MS PowerBI Workload on pre-production 10th Gen Intel® Core™ i7-10700 vs. 6th Gen Intel® Core™ i7-6700. This workload measures the time it takes to change the data source for a Power BI Dashboard, and update the dashboard with the new data.

5 Nearly 3X Faster: 802.11ax 2×2 160 MHz enables 2402 Mbps maximum theoretical data rates, ~3X (2.8X) faster than standard 802.11ac 2×2 80 MHz (867 Mbps) as documented in IEEE 802.11 wireless standard specifications and require the use of similarly configured 802.11ax wireless network routers. Nearly 40% higher peak data rates” Intel® Wireless-AX claims are based on the comparison (39%) of the expected maximum theoretical data rates for dual spatial stream 802.11ax 80 MHz (1201 Mbps) vs. dual spatial stream 802.11ac 80 MHz (867 Mbps) Wi-Fi solutions as documented in IEEE 802.11ax draft 2.0 spec and IEEE 802.11 wireless standard specifications, and require the use of similarly configured 802.11ax wireless network routers.

The post New Intel vPro Platform Enables Uncompromised Productivity and Performance for the Modern Workforce appeared first on Intel Newsroom.

What’s New: Intel Capital, Intel Corporation’s global investment organization, announced today new investments totaling $132 million in 11 technology startups. These companies bring to market breakthrough innovations in artificial intelligence (AI), autonomous computing and chip design. The companies joining Intel Capital’s portfolio are Anodot, Astera Labs, Axonne, Hypersonix, KFBIO, Lilt, MemVerge, ProPlus Electronics, Retrace, Spectrum Materials and Xsight Labs.

“Intel Capital identifies and invests in disruptive startups that are working to improve the way we work and live. Each of our recent investments is pushing the boundaries in areas such as AI, data analytics, autonomous systems and semiconductor innovation. Intel Capital is excited to work with these companies as we jointly navigate the current world challenges and as we together drive sustainable, long-term growth.”
–Wendell Brooks, Intel senior vice president and president of Intel Capital

Intel Capital’s New Investments:

• Anodot (Redwood City, Calif.) uses machine learning to drive the future of analytics — autonomous business monitoring. Fortune 500 companies across telco, finance and digital sectors rely on Anodot’s real-time, contextual alerts to catch the incidents that impact revenue and costs. Examples include drops in success rate, customer incidents, app performance and other business metrics. By helping business users find and fix incidents quickly, Anodot helps customers cut incident management by as much as 80%.
• Astera Labs (Santa Clara, Calif.) is a fabless semiconductor company that develops purpose-built connectivity solutions for data-centric systems to remove performance bottlenecks in compute-intensive workloads such as artificial intelligence and machine learning. The company’s product portfolio includes system-aware semiconductor integrated circuits, boards and services to enable robust connectivity for PCI Express® (PCIe®) and Compute Express Link™ (CXL) solutions.
• Axonne (Sunnyvale, Calif.) develops next-generation high-speed Ethernet network connectivity solutions for automobiles. Axonne’s solutions integrate systems in the connected car, such as autonomous driving sensors and displays with compute clusters. The company’s proprietary mixed signal circuits, algorithms and digital signal processing help with demanding applications, such as autonomous driving and infotainment, that require a high degree of functional safety, reliability, security and electric vehicle-friendly power efficiency. These solutions also help to ease the transition of in-vehicle legacy electrical/electronic architectures to scalable and adaptable service-based zones and beyond.
• Hypersonix (San Jose, Calif.) is an AI-powered autonomous analytics platform designed for consumer industries such as retail, restaurants, hospitality and ecommerce. Decision-makers need real-time actionable insights from disparate data sources, such as regional business performance or web traffic. Hypersonix’s platform empowers customers to make faster and smarter decisions that drive profitability, productivity and customer engagement through simple voice and text search, data visualization and interpretation.
• KFBIO (Zhejiang, China) is a biotech company that builds digital pathology systems. Its pathology scanner improves on traditional microscopes with digital capabilities and connectivity. KFBIO’s medical image processing uses big data, cloud computing and AI to quickly and reliably scan and digitize images, making them easier to share for remote consultation with experts, and improve speed and accuracy of AI-aided pathologist diagnoses.
• Lilt (San Francisco) aims to make the world’s information accessible to all with AI-powered language translation software and services. Traditional translation services can be time-consuming and costly – impeding companies from translating all the information that could be useful. Lilt’s software provides accurate, localized and cost-effective translation. Combining adaptive neural machine translation technology, a translation management system and professional translators, Lilt enables organizations to use language translation to scale their localization programs, accelerate go-to-market strategies and improve the global customer experience.
• MemVerge (Milpitas, Calif.) is a software company founded on the vision that every application should run in memory. MemVerge’s Memory Machine™ software is the foundation for a new era of Big Memory computing, providing petabyte-size pools of shared persistent memory and powerful data services so that data-centric applications such as AI, machine learning, financial market data analytics and high-performance computing are easier to develop and deploy. MemVerge’s Big Memory software lowers the cost of memory, allows it to scale out and makes it highly available with memory data services such as ZeroIO™ snapshot, memory replication, and lightning-fast recovery.
• ProPlus Electronics (Shandong, China) is an electronic design automation (“EDA”) company, specializing in advanced device modeling and fast circuit simulation solutions. ProPlus helps to close the divide between design and manufacturing with software that makes chip design faster and fabrication yields higher, allowing the semiconductor industry to create more powerful and diverse products.
• Retrace (San Francisco) believes that smarter, more innovative use of dental data is essential for reducing the oral disease burden. Retrace applies artificial intelligence and other advanced technology in its predictive analytics platform that uses real-time data to improve dental decision-making. Retrace empowers health plans, providers, and patients to create a more cost-effective, evidence-based oral healthcare experience.
• Spectrum Materials (Fujian, China) is a high-purity specialty gas and material supplier for semiconductor fabs. It has one of the largest germane production bases in Quanzhou, Fujian. Led by veteran industry experts, Spectrum Materials is dedicated to providing critical specialty gas and material solutions for advanced process node applications of multiple leading fabs around the world.
• Xsight Labs (Kiryat Gat, Israel) develops innovative technology for accelerating next generation, cloud-based, data-intensive workloads such as machine learning, data analytics and disaggregated storage. In this data-centric era with exponential bandwidth growth, Xsight provides new chipset designs that enhance scalability, performance and efficiency.

Why It Is Important: Intel Capital continues to accelerate and develop technology and innovation that will enrich lives and how people work:

• Intel Capital is on track to invest between $300 million and $500 million in technology companies in 2020, spanning technology domains in artificial intelligence, intelligent edge and network transformation. These technologies will bring broad transformations to industries such as healthcare, automotive and consumer goods. Intel Capital continues to partner with and add value to companies of all stages that make a difference.1
• Intel Capital believes a diverse workforce enhances innovation, and its investments reflect this. In 2019, Intel Capital made 32 percent of its new investments in startups led by women, underrepresented minorities, members of the LGBTQ community, entrepreneurs living with disabilities and/or veterans, up from 18 percent in 2018. In 2015, Intel Capital announced its goal to invest $125 million over five years in companies with diverse leadership. That goal was achieved two years early in 2018; as of the first quarter of 2020, Intel Capital reached a new milestone, surpassing $300 million invested since publicly announcing its initiative.
• Intel Capital is committed to bringing resources and expertise to accelerate the work of these teams and the realization of potentially world-changing technologies. In 2019, Intel Capital invested $466 million in 36 new investments and 35 follow-on investments, led 72% of its deals and had 22 successful exits. It delivered active support to advise entrepreneurs to build successful and scalable businesses through mentorship, collaborative innovation, go-to-market strategies, company board membership and facilitation of more than 3,000 portfolio introductions to Global 2000 decision-makers.

More Context: Intel Capital | Intel Capital News

The Small Print: 1Some of the statements in this article may be forward-looking statements or statements of future expectations based on currently available information. Statements were provided by the companies mentioned in the article. Such statements are naturally subject to risks and uncertainties. Actual results may be materially different from those anticipated by such statements.  Neither Intel Capital nor any of the companies mentioned in this article (including their respective affiliates) will be liable for any decision made or action taken in conjunction with the information and/or statements in this article or for any related damages.

About Intel Capital

Intel Capital invests in innovative startups targeting artificial intelligence, autonomous vehicles, datacenter and cloud, 5G, next-generation compute and a wide range of other disruptive technologies. Since 1991, Intel Capital has invested US$12.9 billion in more than 1,582 companies worldwide, and 692 portfolio companies have gone public or participated in a merger. Intel Capital curates thousands of business development introductions each year between its portfolio companies and the Global 2000. For more information on what makes Intel Capital one of the world’s most powerful venture capital firms, visit www.intelcapital.com or follow @Intelcapital.

The post Intel Capital Invests $132 Million in 11 Disruptive Technology Startups appeared first on Intel Newsroom.

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What’s New: Intel Labs and the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania (Penn Medicine) are co-developing technology to enable a federation of 29 international healthcare and research institutions led by Penn Medicine to train artificial intelligence (AI) models that identify brain tumors using a privacy-preserving technique called federated learning. Penn Medicine’s work is funded by the Informatics Technology for Cancer Research (ITCR) program of the National Cancer Institute (NCI) of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), through a three-year, $1.2 million grant awarded to principal investigator Dr. Spyridon Bakas at the Center for Biomedical Image Computing and Analytics (CBICA) of the University of Pennsylvania.

“AI shows great promise for the early detection of brain tumors, but it will require more data than any single medical center holds to reach its full potential. Using Intel software and hardware and support from some of Intel Labs’ brightest minds, we are working with the University of Pennsylvania and a federation of 29 collaborating medical centers to advance the identification of brain tumors while protecting sensitive patient data.”
– Jason Martin, principal engineer, Intel Labs

How It Works: Penn Medicine and 29 healthcare and research institutions from the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany, the Netherlands, Switzerland and India will use federated learning, which is a distributed machine learning approach that enables organizations to collaborate on deep learning projects without sharing patient data.

Penn Medicine and Intel Labs were the first to publish a paper on federated learning in the medical imaging domain, particularly demonstrating that the federated learning method could train a model to over 99% of the accuracy of a model trained in the traditional, non-private method. This paper was originally presented at the International Conference on Medical Image Computing and Computer Assisted Intervention (MICCAI) 2018 in Granada, Spain. The new work will leverage Intel software and hardware to implement federated learning in a manner that provides additional privacy protection to both the model and the data.

“It is widely accepted by our scientific community that machine learning training requires ample and diverse data that no single institution can hold,” Bakas said. “We are coordinating a federation of 29 collaborating international healthcare and research institutions, which will be able to train state-of-the-art AI models for healthcare, using privacy-preserving machine learning technologies, including federated learning. This year, the federation will begin developing algorithms that identify brain tumors from a greatly expanded version of the International Brain Tumor Segmentation (BraTS) challenge dataset. This federation will allow medical researchers access to vastly greater amounts of healthcare data while protecting the security of that data.”

Why It Matters: According to the American Brain Tumor Association (ABTA), nearly 80,000 people will be diagnosed with a brain tumor this year, with more than 4,600 of them being children. In order to train and build a model to detect a brain tumor that could aid in early detection and better outcomes, researchers need access to large amounts of relevant medical data. However, it is essential that the data remain private and protected, which is where federated learning with Intel technology comes in. By utilizing this approach, researchers from all partner organizations will be able to work together on building and training an algorithm to detect a brain tumor while protecting sensitive medical data.

What’s Next: In 2020, Penn and the 29 international healthcare and research institutions will use Intel’s federated learning hardware and software to produce a new state-of-the-art AI model that is trained on the largest brain tumor dataset to date — all without sensitive patient data leaving the individual collaborators. The subset of collaborating institutions expected to participate in initiating the first phase of this federation includes the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, Washington University in St. Louis, the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, Vanderbilt University, Queen’s University, Technical University of Munich, University of Bern, King’s College London and Tata Memorial Hospital.

More Context: Federated Learning for Medical Imaging (blog) | Advancing Both AI and Privacy is Not a Zero-Sum Game (Fortune Op-Ed) | Artificial Intelligence at Intel | Federated Learning in Medicine

The post Intel Works with University of Pennsylvania in Using Privacy-Preserving AI to Identify Brain Tumors appeared first on Intel Newsroom.

What’s New: New computing accelerators are rapidly emerging, and organizations need to examine time and financial considerations associated with developing performance-sensitive applications that can run on both new and existing computing platforms. Commissioned by Intel, a recent research report from J.Gold Associates, “oneAPI: Software Abstraction for a Heterogeneous Computing World,” discusses the importance of application portability, the need for enterprises to move toward a new cross-architecture model with multiple computing accelerators, and the insights on oneAPI’s open approach to cross-architecture development.

“A wide array of accelerated processors is coming to market at an ever-faster pace and more application workloads can take advantage of their capabilities, but only if the applications are built with a model that assures maximum compatibility and flexibility. A cross-architecture model like oneAPI goes a long way to assuring developers of performance-sensitive applications that portability across new and emerging acceleration platforms can take place without having to totally rewrite the app.”
–Jack Gold, J.Gold Associates

What the Study Says: The report lays out the case for enterprises and developers to transition to oneAPI by presenting an example of a typical application development process and the subsequent migration of the developed application for use with a new hardware accelerator. The report also details why the inevitable move toward specialized accelerators makes now the right time for unified programming, and analyzes the cost and time benefits that can be realized by writing applications that can target multiple compute devices while avoiding architecture and vendor lock-in.

Key points of the study include:

• Data-centric workloads and the architectures that can best process them continue to diversify.
• Moving to a cross-architecture model for application development can save an organization a significant amount of time and money each time a typical performance-sensitive application is moved to a new computing platform – over five months and $300,000 in the example used in the report.
• The oneAPI initiative is an open, cross-industry approach to the next generation of application creation that helps deliver both increased developer productivity and uncompromised application performance.

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Why It’s Important: The emergence of heterogeneous computing through the availability of diverse and evolving hardware accelerators presents organizations with the opportunity to save time and money when porting existing code by using a unified programming model. oneAPI is a cross-industry, open, standards-based, unified programming model that delivers a common developer experience across CPUs, GPUs, FPGAs and specialized accelerators. The open oneAPI specification builds upon industry standards and existing developer programming models to enable a diverse set of hardware across multiple architectures and vendors. The oneAPI industry initiative encourages collaboration on the oneAPI specification and compatible oneAPI implementations across the ecosystem. More information on the oneAPI industry initiative can be found on the oneAPI website.

More Context: oneAPI: Software Abstraction for a Heterogeneous Computing World

The post Unified Programming Model Critical to Uncompromised Application Performance, Saves Time and Money, Study Finds appeared first on Intel Newsroom.

SANTA CLARA, Calif., May 4, 2020 – Intel Corporation today announced it has acquired Moovit, a mobility-as-a-service (MaaS) solutions company, for approximately $900 million ($840 million net of Intel Capital equity gain). Moovit is known for its urban mobility application that offers travelers around the world the best multimodal trip planning by combining public transportation, bicycle and scooter services, ride-hailing, and car-sharing. The addition of Moovit brings Intel’s Mobileye closer to achieving its plan to become a complete mobility provider, including robotaxi services, which is forecast to be an estimated $160 billion opportunity by 2030.

Moovit is a Mobility-as-a-Service (MaaS) platform company best known for its mobile application that provides public transit and navigation data to simplify urban mobility in 3,100 cities around the world. The app experience will not change and the company will continue to serve users, customers and partners with the exceptional level of service, professionalism and dedication they’ve come to expect. (Credit: Moovit)
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“Intel’s purpose is to create world-changing technology that enriches the lives of every person on Earth, and our Mobileye team delivers on that purpose every day,” said Bob Swan, Intel CEO. “Mobileye’s ADAS technology is already improving the safety of millions of cars on the road, and Moovit accelerates their ability to truly revolutionize transportation – reducing congestion and saving lives – as a full-stack mobility provider.”

More: Autonomous Driving at Intel | Mobileye News | Moovit + Mobileye = revolutionize urban mobility! (Moovit Blog) | There is More to Our Moovit Acquisition Than Meets the Eye (Amnon Shashua Editorial)

Moovit has established its leadership in the MaaS space with more than 800 million users and services in 3,100 cities across 102 countries. Today, Mobileye is the leading automotive solutions partner that enables advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS) deployed on nearly 60 million vehicles with more than 25 automaker partners.

Mobileye is a growth engine for Intel as the company transforms for a world where the exponential growth of data fuels demand for technology solutions that can process, move and store more data faster. Intel is investing and expanding to serve new data-rich market opportunities, including the fast-growing market for ADAS, data and MaaS technologies, which together represent an opportunity totaling more than $230 billion by 2030. Upon close, Moovit will join the Mobileye business while retaining its brand and existing partnerships.

Conference Call Replay: Intel Mobileye: Moovit Acquisition Conference Call of May 5, 2020.

https://newsroom.intel.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/11/2020/05/intel-moovit-press-analyst-call-may-5-2020.mp3

Speakers: Professor Amnon Shashua, CEO of Mobileye; Nir Erez, CEO of Moovit; Wendell Brooks, president of Intel Capital; and Trey Campbell, vice president of Investor Relations at Intel. (MP3)

“Moovit’s massive global user base, proprietary transportation data, global editors community, strong partnerships with key transit and mobility ecosystem partners, and highly skilled team is what makes them a great investment,” said Professor Amnon Shashua, CEO of Mobileye. “Moovit is a strong brand trusted by hundreds of millions of people globally. Together, with Mobileye’s extensive capabilities in mapping and self-driving technology, we will be able to accelerate our timeline to transform the future of mobility.”

Moovit was founded in 2012 and is based in Tel Aviv, Israel, with approximately 200 employees. Moovit combines information from public transit operators and authorities with live information from the user community to offer travelers a real-time picture of the best route for their journey. In the past 24 months, Moovit has achieved a seven-times increase in users. Moovit has also signed strategic partnership agreements with major ride-sharing operators and mobility ecosystem companies for analytics, routing, optimization and operations for MaaS. With this acquisition, Mobileye will be able to use Moovit’s large proprietary transportation dataset to optimize predictive technologies based on customer demand and traffic patterns, as well as tap into Moovit’s transit data repository of more than 7,500 key transit agencies and operators, and improve the consumer experience for more than 800 million users worldwide. Moovit’s consumer applications and user experience will continue under its own brand.

Nir Erez is the CEO and co-founder of Moovit. He will join Mobileye’s executive team as an executive vice president. (Credit: Moovit)
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“We are excited to join forces with Mobileye and lead the future revolution of new mobility services,” said Nir Erez, Moovit co-founder and CEO. “Mobility is a basic human right, and as cities become more crowded, urban mobility becomes more difficult. Combining the daily mobility habits and needs of millions of Moovit users with the state-of-the-art, safe, affordable and eco-friendly transportation enabled by self-driving vehicles, we will be able to make cities better places to live in. We share this vision and look forward to making it a reality as part of Mobileye.”

Intel acquired Mobileye in 2017. Since then, Mobileye revenues have more than doubled on the increased adoption of ADAS based on Mobileye’s industry-leading technology. Mobileye’s vision-safety technology aims to make roads safer, reduce traffic congestion and save lives. Mobileye provides a complete autonomous vehicle solution stack that is technically advanced, provides unmatched agility and safety, and copes with a wide variety of driving complexities.

Mobileye’s business model encompasses the entire automated driving value chain, including the front-facing camera that powers most of today’s ADAS, conditional autonomy – also known as level 2+ – and the self-driving system (SDS) for self-driving shuttles and robotaxis as well as consumer autonomous vehicles (AVs). Mobileye has strong performance in every one of these categories with advanced vision sensing technology, crowd-sourced mapping capability (REM) and the Responsibility-Sensitive Safety (RSS) driving policy.

By working together as part of Intel and Mobileye, Moovit will advance the company’s MaaS strategy and the global adoption of autonomous transportation.

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The post Intel Acquires Moovit to Accelerate Mobileye’s Mobility-as-a-Service Offering appeared first on Intel Newsroom.

By Amnon Shashua

We are thrilled to welcome Moovit to the Intel family. Moovit is the world’s best-known transit application that aggregates data from multiple transit partners and customers. With more than 800 million users globally, Moovit collects more than 6 billion data points daily about traffic flow and user demand across more than 3,100 cities in 102 countries and serves more than 7,500 public transit operators. Quite an achievement.

The natural question is why Intel? This is where Mobileye, an Intel company, completes the puzzle.

More: Autonomous Driving at Intel | Mobileye News | Intel Acquires Moovit to Accelerate Mobileye’s Mobility-as-a-Service Offering (News Release) | Moovit + Mobileye = revolutionize urban mobility! (Moovit Blog)

Mobileye is Intel’s arm to foray into the future of transportation. The future of mobility relies on compute and lots of it. We are engaged in designing the most high-density and efficient silicon; cutting-edge algorithms involving artificial intelligence for interpreting sensing data from cameras, radars and lidars; and algorithms for decision-making for autonomous cars all wrapped around unprecedented safety models. While doing so, we are engaged in saving lives through our leading position in driver-assistance systems with nearly 60 million cars equipped with our silicon and algorithms preventing and mitigating accidents every day.

Going forward, all this technology will be integrated into a mobility-as-a-service (MaaS) business – an opportunity estimated to be worth $160 billion by 2030. We have contracts and partnerships around the globe targeting 2022 debut of various manifestations of MaaS.

We have dedicated significant efforts to study the nature of the business:  the value chain formations, the societal and economical pain-points of the urban mobility systems, and the path to weave driverless capabilities into the existing urban transportation fabric.

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We developed a multimodal XaaS strategy that will enable Intel through Mobileye, and now including Moovit, to create a value proposition out of every layer of the solution stack – from the self-driving system as standalone, all the way up to the robotaxi service and experience. This strategy is very nuanced and differs from every other company in this space.

The first critical asset is Mobility Intelligence based on data-driven real-time demand and supply insights allowing for driverless technology to be surgically introduced through various service models such as origin-to-destination, first/last mile and dynamically routed shuttles.

The second critical asset is the transit operators’ operational expertise. This is a core asset to be harnessed through collaborative go-to-market models. Two such canonical models include vehicle-as-a-service (VaaS) and ride-as-a-service (RaaS). In particular, RaaS enables an existing service operator to “summon” an automated mobility solution to cater for un-addressable demand under its service umbrella. VaaS, on the other hand, is a further integrated model in which we offer a dedicated fleet of autonomous vehicles/shuttles to be acquired and assimilated into the transit operator’s backbone and control center together with the Mobility Intelligence software, which assures efficient use of that capital.

With today’s acquisition of Moovit, we have added another critical piece to our mobility stack and accelerated our way towards becoming a complete mobility provider. Beyond the obvious value of Moovit’s data and user base, the company owns underlying assets, capabilities and a partners network that will enable us to turn on affordable and demand-optimized driverless mobility services almost anywhere in the world.

As in Mobileye’s case, Moovit will remain an independent subsidiary propelling its core business forward. Being a part of Intel has empowered Mobileye to dream beyond computer vision and into the driverless future, and now we intend to empower Moovit to dream bigger, reach higher and, together, make an impact on the future of transportation.

Professor Amnon Shashua is senior vice president at Intel Corporation and president and chief executive officer of Mobileye, an Intel company.

The post There is More to Our Moovit Acquisition Than Meets the Eye appeared first on Intel Newsroom.

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What’s New: Intel introduced today the 10th Gen Intel® Core™ S-series desktop processors, including Intel’s flagship Core i9-10900K processor, the world’s fastest gaming processor1. With speeds reaching up to a maximum of 5.3 GHz with Intel® Thermal Velocity Boost2 out of the box, 10th Gen Intel Core desktop processors deliver real-world performance for a new level of experience in gaming.

“Intel is committed to enabling the future of powerful desktop gaming by continuously pushing the performance boundary to deliver an amazing PC gaming experience. The 10th Gen Intel Core S-series for desktops, and the Intel Core i9-10900K processor, the world’s fastest gaming processor reinforces our commitment to the gaming and enthusiast communities.”
– Brandt Guttridge, Intel senior director of the Desktop Products Group

Why It’s Great for Gaming and Overclocking: At the top of the stack is the unlocked 10th Gen Intel Core i9-10900K, the world’s fastest gaming processor1, featuring up to 10 cores, 20 threads and DDR4-2933 memory speeds. The i9-10900K processor powers the ultimate gaming experience, allowing more tuning control, faster multitasking and smoother gameplay. The new Intel® Turbo Boost Max Technology 3.0 provides automatic performance boosts on lightly threaded applications, while per-core hyperthreading control allows experienced overclockers to decide which threads to turn on or off on a per-core basis. Improvements in this generation include:

• Up to 187 frames per second3 for in-game performance while streaming and recording, and up to 63 percent more frames per second4 in gaming compared with a 3-year-old PC.
• Up to 12 percent faster5 video editing compared with the previous generation, and up to 15 percent faster6 video editing compared with a 3-year-old PC.
• Up 18 percent faster7 4K video editing compared with the previous generation, and up to 35 percent faster8 4K video editing compared with a 3-year-old PC.
• Up to 31 percent better overall system performance compared with a 3-year-old PC9, 10.

About Key Features and Capabilities: The 10th Gen Intel Core S-series processors deliver smooth gameplay through best-in-class connectivity11, immersive entertainment and enhanced streaming.

• Intel Thermal Velocity Boost: Gamers and creators get an opportunistic and automatic boost across single-core and multicore workloads, with up to 5.3 GHz.
• Intel Hyperthreading Technology: Now across 10th Gen Intel Core i9 to i3 processors.
• Enhanced Core & Memory Overclocking3: Gain ultimate control when overclocking your processor and key system components with features enabled by new unlocked and overclockable 10th Gen Intel Core processors.
• Intel® Ethernet Connection I225: Now available on the 10th Gen platform, 2.5G Intel Ethernet Connector I225 delivers greater than two times the network speeds of 1GB Ethernet on existing cabling.
• Intel® Wi-Fi 6 AX201: Now integrated into 10th Gen Intel Core desktop processors, Intel Wi-Fi 6 (Gig+) delivers responsive gameplay, nearly three times faster12 downloads and more reliable connections. Delivers best-in-class connectivity11 with the freedom and flexibility to game or create anywhere throughout the home or office.

When You Can Get It: 10th Gen Intel Core S-series processors are expected to be available globally through normal retail channels and in desktops sold worldwide by OEMs and channel system integrators, starting in May.

More Context: 10th Gen Intel Core S-series (Product Brief) | 10th Gen Intel Core Processors – Amazing Gaming Starts With Intel (Press Kit) | More Powerful Edge Processing with 10th Generation Intel Core Processors for IoT and Edge | A New Power Standard has Desktops Sipping Energy when Idling | Intel® Z490 Chipset (Product Brief)

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The Small Print: All information provided here is subject to change without notice. Contact your Intel representative to obtain the latest Intel product specifications, roadmaps, and related information.

Performance results are based on testing as of April 17, 2020 in configurations and may not reflect all publicly available updates. See backup for configuration details. No product or component can be absolutely secure.

Software and workloads used in performance tests may have been optimized for performance only on Intel microprocessors. Performance tests, such as SYSmark and MobileMark, are measured using specific computer systems, components, software, operations and functions. Any change to any of those factors may cause the results to vary. You should consult other information and performance tests to assist you in fully evaluating your contemplated purchases, including the performance of that product when combined with other products. For more complete information about performance and benchmark results, visit http://www.intel.com/benchmarks

Intel technologies may require enabled hardware, software or service activation.

Your costs and results may vary.

Statements in this document that refer to Intel’s plans and expectations for the quarter, the year, and the future, are forward-looking statements that involve a number of risks and uncertainties. A detailed discussion of the factors that could affect Intel’s results and plans is included in Intel’s SEC filings, including the annual report on Form 10-K.

Altering clock frequency or voltage may void any product warranties and reduce stability, security, performance, and life of the processor and other components. Check with system and component manufacturers for details.

© Intel Corporation. Intel, the Intel logo, and other Intel marks are trademarks of Intel Corporation or its subsidiaries. Other names and brands may be claimed as the property of others.

1As measured by in-game benchmark mode performance (score or frames per second) where available, or frames per second where benchmark mode is unavailable. PC Gaming Processors Compared: 10th Gen Intel® Core™ i9-10900K, Intel® Core™ i9-9900KS, AMD Ryzen™ 9 3950X. Prices of compared products may differ. Configurations: Graphics: Nvidia GeForce RTX 2080 Ti, Memory: 4x8GB DDR4 (2666, 2933 or 3200 per highest speed of the corresponding processor), Storage: Intel Optane SSD 905P, OS Windows 10 Pro 1909 v720 19H2(RS6). Results: 10th Gen Intel® Core™ i9-10900K scored better on the majority of the 25+ game titles tested. Intel will be marketing the 10th Gen Intel® Core™ i9-10900K with the tag line “Elite Real World Performance” in certain jurisdictions, including PRC and Vietnam. Intel will be marketing the 10th Gen Intel® Core™ i9-10900K with the tag line “Intel’s Fastest Gaming Processor” in certain jurisdictions, including Argentina, Belarus, Belize, Chile, Egypt, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Italy, Japan, Panama, Peru, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Russia, and Ukraine. If you are media, an influencer or a marketer from these countries, or otherwise communicating directly to residents in these countries (e.g., on local-language social media), please only refer to the tag line Intel will be using in that country in lieu of the claim on this slide/document.

2Includes the effect of Intel® Thermal Velocity Boost (Intel® TVB), a feature that opportunistically and automatically increases clock frequency above single-core and multi-core Intel® Turbo Boost Technology frequencies based on how much the processor is operating below its maximum temperature and whether turbo power budget is available. The frequency gain and duration is dependent on the workload, capabilities of the processor and the processor cooling solution.

3As measured by Megatasking workload on PUBG on 10th Gen Intel® Core™ i9-10900K.

4As measured by Players Unknown Battleground (PUBG) on 10th Gen Intel® Core™ i9-10900K vs. 7th Gen Intel® Core™ i7-7700K.

5As measured by Adobe Lightroom Classic workload RUG 1010 on Intel® Core™ i9-10900K vs. Intel® Core™ i9- 9900K.

6As measured by Adobe Lightroom Classic workload RUG 1010 on Intel® Core™ i9-10900K vs. Intel® Core™ i7-7700K.

7As measured by Adobe Premier Pro CC workload RUG 1209 on Intel® Core™ i9-10900K vs. Intel® Core™ i9- 9900K.

8As measured by Adobe Premier Pro CC workload RUG 1209 on Intel® Core™ i9-10900K vs. Intel® Core™ i7-7700K.

9As measured by SYSMark*2018 on on Intel® Core™ i9-10900K vs. Intel® Core™ i7-7700K.

10Intel technologies may require enabled hardware, software or service activation.

11‘Best in Class Wi-Fi 6’: Intel® Wi-Fi 6 (Gig+) products support optional 160 MHz channels, enabling the fastest possible theoretical maximum speeds (2402 Mbps) for typical 2×2 802.11ax PC Wi-Fi products. Premium Intel® Wi-Fi 6 (Gig+) products enable 2-4X faster maximum theoretical speeds compared standard 2×2 (1201 Mbps) or 1×1 (600 Mbps) 802.11ax PC Wi-Fi products, which only support the mandatory requirement of 80 MHz channels. Gigabit Wi-Fi Requirements: To achieve speed of over 1 Gbps requires Gig internet service, router/gateway with either Wi-Fi 6 or 11ac with 160 MHz channel support, and PC with Intel® Wireless 9260/9560 or Intel® Wi-Fi 6 (Gig+) AX200/AX201.

12WiFi 6 ‘Nearly 3X Faster’: 802.11ax 2×2 160MHz enables 2402Mbps maximum theoretical data rates, ~3X (2.8X) faster than standard 802.11ac 2×2 80MHz (867Mbps) as documented in IEEE 802.11 wireless standard specifications, and require the use of similarly configured 802.11ax wireless network routers.

The post Intel Delivers World’s Fastest Gaming Processor appeared first on Intel Newsroom.

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Our expert: Stephen Eastman, platform power specialist in Intel’s Client Computing Group, and his team work on reducing the idle power that desktop PC’s use. Desktop computers often spend more time idle than in any other use. Any way to reduce power used during these long stretches of minimal activity is vital to cutting a PC’s overall power consumption.

More: Single Rail Power Supply ATX12VO Design Guide | How Intel is changing the future of power supplies with its ATX12VO spec (PCWorld) | Future of Technology Series | Client Computing News

Less is more: Using less power is always good, but it will be even more important when governments around the world introduce new energy regulations for desktop computers. This includes EPA’s ENERGY STAR for Computers v8 in 2020, the California Energy Commission Title 20, Tier 2 requirement in 2021 (with other U.S. states following), and Japan’s Top Runner program in 2022. All these regulations are requiring PC makers to adjust their desktop power targets.

A single rail power supply design is one answer to help OEMs reduce desktop PC idle power and meet the new government regulations. For years there have been custom single rail power supply designs. But until Intel created the ATX12VO design and publicly shared it, there was no industry standard to help PC-makers reduce the energy desktop systems use when idling.

But it’s more complicated than just a new power supply. The new ATX12VO standard requires a redesign to the motherboard. The two parts work in tandem under the new standard.

“This is a part of Intel’s greater PC story to enable the most energy efficient desktop computers,” says Eastman. Intel is a processor company, he says, but it is also a company that helps OEMs. And that’s why Intel spent the last two years creating and sharing this standard.

The industry’s first ATX12VO motherboard: On April 30, PC manufacturer ASRock launched the industry’s first ATX12VO motherboard around the Intel 10th Gen Intel Core S-series platform. It reduces idle power by 27% compared to a similar featured motherboard and traditional ATX multi-rail power supply design.

“We’re extremely delighted to co-develop this revolutionary motherboard — Z490 Phantom Gaming 4SR — with Intel. This new design is able to improve power efficiency of the PC and meet new energy regulations. We believe the new ATX12VO will be the solution for the next generation of personal computer,” says Chris Lee, general manager of ASRock Motherboard BU.

Intel is also working with power supply unit builders such as FSP, High Power, Channel Well Technology and Corsair to build ATX12VO power supply units to go with the motherboards.

Knowledge is power: Intel is releasing the spec to provide the industry with a consistent design. It’s especially important for medium to smaller OEMs that don’t have the resources to create their own power supply spec. It will allow them to continue selling devices once new energy regulations go into effect. For a consumer who wants to build their own PC, they’ll have to have both the new power supply and the new motherboard that work together.

Currently, power supplies change the AC current at the plug to the DC current your computer needs. That conversion can cause the greatest loss of power when a computer is idling and at its most inefficient. Most power supply units have 12-, 3.3- and 5-volt rails, or circuitry that creates the voltage. The ATX12VO standard takes out the 3.3- and 5-volt rails and moves the creation of these voltages to the motherboard where they can be more energy-efficient.

“This makes no difference to performance. It makes no difference to the end user except for using less idle power. It just makes a difference to the system builder,” Eastman says.

The post A New Power Standard has Desktops Sipping Energy when Idling appeared first on Intel Newsroom.

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What’s New: As part of Intel’s $50 million pandemic response, Intel and Medical Informatics Corp. (MIC) today announced the Scale to Serve Program to help hospitals rapidly install and scale MIC’s Sickbay™ platform. The platform is designed to help hospitals rapidly expand intensive care unit (ICU) bed capacity and create more efficient care of the most critical patients while also reducing risk of COVID-19 exposure for critical care providers who are at a higher risk of exposure due to the nature of their work. Through the Scale to Serve program, Intel has agreed to fund the implementation fees and MIC will waive the first 90 days of software subscription licensing fees for the first 100 hospitals that qualify.

“Intel technology has a role to help accelerate the core capabilities our medical community requires to combat COVID-19. This is why we’re committed to applying our technology to helping protect our front-line healthcare providers who are providing care for ICU patients by accelerating the access to virtual patient monitoring solutions. The solution improves the efficiency of ICU patient care from anywhere while protecting the health of caregivers on the front line of this crisis.”
–Lisa Spelman, Intel corporate vice president and general manager of the Xeon and Memory Group

Why It Matters: Hospitals are facing challenges due to the pandemic: from ramping ICU capacity and staffing the front lines to getting providers access to the data they need to effectively intervene. They are challenged with meeting these needs because patient data is currently tied to medical devices at the bedside and locked down in proprietary formats that don’t easily integrate with each other. The Sickbay platform helps address these issues by unlocking and unifying this disparate data from the bedside to enable flexible, scalable remote monitoring from any web-enabled device to create clinical distancing and help protect providers from exposure to COVID-19. The solution allows hospitals to turn any acute care bed into a monitored ICU bed in minutes and create flexible remote workflows, including the ability for one provider to remotely direct care for up to 100 patients in a single dashboard or “virtual ICU” (vICU) and/or create flexible virtual rounding of patients from conference rooms, offices or home on any PC. This flexibility helps hospitals rapidly expand staff capacity, including staff that may be in quarantine or coming out of retirement, to get more eyes on patients and help hospitals save more lives – both from patients and healthcare workers. Remote views bring together data from multiple medical devices, including ventilators and cardiac monitors from different vendors, to ensure that all members of the care team have the data they need to take action.

“In healthcare today, less than 1% of the data being generated by patients makes it into the electronic health record, forcing clinicians to work without a complete picture. We unlock that data to allow for predictive analytics, remote patient monitoring, AI and machine learning applications that will ultimately help providers create a new standard of care tomorrow,” said Emma Fauss, chief executive officer, MIC. “What COVID has done is crystallize the immediate need around reducing interactions in the room and looking at resource limitations in a new way. How can you monitor more patients with less, without sacrificing the quality of care? It requires being able to monitor patients remotely, monitor multiple patients at once, and leverage data for patient trajectory, analytics and risk scoring.

“Scale to Serve embodies what MIC and Intel believe: We’re here to serve healthcare providers on the front line to do their job effectively.  We want to be there to support that mission and ultimately transform the standard of care.”

About Sickbay’s Early Implementation: In March 2020, Houston Methodist Hospital deployed Sickbay as part of its telehealth initiative to create a vICU. Within one day of go-live, Houston Methodist began to see COVID-19 patients. Due to Sickbay’s software-based design, Houston Methodist was able to turn on new COVID-19 ICU beds in minutes. The hospital’s staff currently has the ability to monitor up to 180 COVID-19 patients remotely from their on-site command center, conference rooms and offices. Other MIC clients are also beginning to expand capacity for COVID-19, including the University of Alabama at Birmingham Hospital.

“We plan to use Sickbay in a centralized monitoring area where a single physician or nurse can monitor patients remotely and leverage hierarchical categorization of patients. We also plan to give our physicians who may be at higher risk of infection the opportunity to provide highly important consultation, without having to be in the line of fire, by logging in from a remote site on a web-based, secure, HIPPA-compliant system,” said Dr. Dan Berkowitz, M.D., chair of the Department of Anesthesiology and Perioperative Medicine at University of Alabama at Birmingham Hospital. “Every time a physician goes into an ICU room, there’s a risk of exposure and a need to utilize PPE. We can reduce exposure risk by enabling the physicians to access the physiologic patient data remotely and save precious PPE.”

» Download video: “Houston Methodist Deploys Medical Informatics Corp.’s Sickbay Platform (B-Roll)”

How It Works: MIC Sickbay is the only scalable FDA-cleared clinical surveillance and analytics platform created for ICUs. The software-based monitoring and analytics platform is vendor-agnostic, integrating seamlessly with medical devices that hospitals use. Sickbay utilizes Intel® Xeon® processor-based platforms to deliver data visualization and analytics, and can be accessed by providers using any connected PC, tablet or phone. Once deployed, Sickbay supports evidence-based care decisions by providing providers with near real-time waveform data across connected devices integrated into a single view, along with patient history for the entire length of stay, to help care teams automate the building of trends and create patient-specific analytics at scale.

Hospitals interested in access can apply for the program on the MIC website.

What’s Next: Intel and MIC are talking to hospitals across the U.S. to enable them to quickly deploy Sickbay and protect their critical care providers.

More Context: ATA Spotlight on COVID-19: Scaling ICU Beds and Capabilities (Webinar)

More Customer Stories: Intel Customer Spotlight on Intel.com | Customer Stories on Intel Newsroom

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The post Intel and MIC Announce Scale to Serve Program to Rapidly Expand Remote ICUs to 100 US Hospitals appeared first on Intel Newsroom.

What’s New: In this unprecedented time of change, many organizations are faced with supporting a newly remote workforce, and embracing the right technology is more critical than ever to best support that employee base.  In October 2019, Intel commissioned Forrester Consulting to evaluate the current and potential future states of PC procurement and management. The study, entitled “How PCs Will Drive the Future of Work,” concluded that improving PC performance to enable increased productivity was a top business priority, and Forrester has confirmed the current environment amplifies the findings.

“PC modernization is not only vital to employee productivity, but also employee engagement. Traditionally those vectors have been at odds with the level of security you can provide. This is even more true today as employees are looking for more flexibility in where they work from, how they connect to the network, and how they rely on applications and data that may be hosted in the cloud. Intel is creating the platform that empowers every employee’s greatest contribution, without sacrificing performance or security.”
– Michael Nordquist, director of Strategic Planning and Architecture, Business Client Platforms at Intel

What the Study Says: In today’s increasingly remote world, PC management and remote workforce support has become one of the biggest topics on IT decision- maker minds. However, IT departments are struggling to maintain a secure environment for devices while simultaneously meeting employee expectations.

As part of the study, Forrester surveyed 635 IT decision-makers (ITDMs) across industries in the United States, Canada, Japan, the United Kingdom, France and Germany.

Forrester found that companies are realizing the value of supporting employees by improving PC performance and want to invest accordingly. Yet they are struggling to operationalize the tactics they know will drive employee experience and productivity. Key findings include:

• Improving the performance of PCs to enable increased productivity is the top priority for businesses in 2020. Eighty-seven percent of respondents see the PC as central to their businesses and recognize that supporting a secure and efficient PC environment is crucial for a successful strategy. Sixty-seven percent of enterprises and mid-market companies plan on investing more in PCs in 2020, compared with 2019.
• IT teams often spend too much time reacting to device issues, rather than proactively creating better employee experiences. IT teams are still struggling to manage refresh cycles and maintain secure environments. Fifty-one percent of ITDMs revealed that employees often express displeasure to their IT teams regarding their PCs. Inconsistent and inconvenient PC updates, which inevitably disrupt employees’ daily work, negatively affect employee productivity and experiences. Only 29 percent of ITDMs are looking into alternative services like device-as-a-service (DaaS) to effectively mitigate these challenges.
• Most companies see PC refresh as an important driver of employee productivity and endpoint security. Ninety-one percent agreed that PC refresh is a crucial component to ensuring employees have the most secure tools and resources available to keep their work and company data private. Equipping employees with powerful, more secure PCs helps allow leadership to offer employees the opportunity to take advantage of different work environments or work/life streams without risking vulnerability. Eighty-five percent of information technology decision-makers noted that their company leadership understands the links among PC refresh, employee experience and productivity, however they haven’t efficiently been able to act on these with only 36% of ITDMs undergoing a PC refresh every two years or less.

Why It’s Important: By shifting their focus to improving PC performance (particularly when supporting a newly remote workforce), businesses are recognizing that they will be able to improve not only employee productivity, but also increase levels of employee engagement. Consistently being engaged and motivated to accomplish work tasks due to superior technology is not only good for productivity, but also promotes higher-quality work. This realization is driving more businesses to invest in cloud-based device management with higher-performing, more secure PCs. More specifically, 56 percent of ITDMs are investing in cloud-based device management, while 55 percent are prioritizing more secure devices and 48 percent are investing in higher-performing, faster chips. The PC is still the tool of choice when employees want to focus and get work done. Forrester’s findings are beneficial in helping IT departments not only manage through the COVID-19 crisis, but also put the right pieces in place for an increasingly remote workforce in the future.

More context: How PCs Will Drive the Future of Work (Study) | How PCs Drive the Future of Work (Blog) | Client Computing at Intel

» Click for full infographic

The post PC Modernization is Essential to the Future of Work, Study Finds appeared first on Intel Newsroom.

What’s New: Today, Microsoft Azure DCsv2-Series featuring a hardware-based trusted execution environment (TEE) built on Intel® Software Guard Extensions (Intel® SGX) was released for general availability. Built on Intel’s trusted foundation, the Azure DCsv2-Series makes confidential computing broadly available to enterprise customers who want to leverage cloud computing while helping to keep sensitive workloads protected.

“Customers demand the capability to reduce the attack surface and help protect sensitive data in the cloud by encrypting data in use. Our collaboration with Microsoft brings enterprise-ready confidential computing solutions to market and enables customers to take greater advantage of the benefits of cloud and multiparty compute paradigms using Intel SGX technology.”
–Anil Rao, Intel vice president, Data Center Security and Systems Architecture

Why It Matters: Combined with encrypted data storage and transmission methods, TEEs can create an end-to-end protection architecture for sensitive data, such as typically regulated data in financial services and healthcare. Microsoft Azure is the first public cloud provider to offer broad virtualization services using hardware-optimized TEEs as encryption mechanisms to help protect customer data while in use. It allows data to be processed in the cloud while offering even greater control over security and privacy. Backed by Intel SGX, Azure confidential computing virtual machines run code and data in isolation from the operating system, hypervisor or virtual machine manager, and other privileged processes.

Intel SGX is available today on Intel® Xeon® processor E-2200 family, and the company is working to scale Intel SGX across our mainstream Xeon platforms in upcoming generations. As announced in February, Intel is continuing to extend Intel SGX with larger enclaves, extended protections to offload accelerators, and improved performance. These improvements will further expand the number of usages able to leverage these advanced application isolation capabilities.

What’s Next: Intel and Microsoft empower customers to execute their data in a more secure and private cloud environment. As two of the founding members of the Confidential Computing Consortium, both companies are committed to collaborating with the industry to deliver a more secure computing infrastructure today and in the future.

More Context: Data Center News

The Small Print: No product or component can be absolutely secure.

The post Intel Provides Trusted Foundation for Azure Confidential Computing appeared first on Intel Newsroom.

Gary Xiong, a wireless standards engineer and Intel’s 2020 Inventor of the Year, works in Hillsboro, Oregon. With a team from Intel’s Next Generation and Standards Group, Xiong is helping invent technologies that will underpin future wireless networks. (Photos Courtesty of Gary Xiong)

Our expert: Gary Xiong and his Intel teammates across the world from the Next Generation and Standards Group are figuring out how advanced 5G and 6G will carry even more throughput and responsiveness compared with today’s wireless standards. In recognition of Xiong’s work to invent the technologies that will underpin future wireless networks, the wireless standards engineer was named Intel’s 2020 Inventor of the Year.

More: Future of Technology Series | 5G at Intel

‘A crazy idea that bumps against the ceiling of material physics’: Today, Xiong and his team are focused on overcoming some of the limitations of 5G bands and getting ready for 6G. “We’re always pushing the boundary of what is physically possible by going back to basics and coming up with new ideas to overcome current obstacles,” he says. One idea Xiong and team are working on is changing the waveforms of future wireless signals, which could significantly affect how base station silicon is designed. “We’re imagining super wideband spectrums at perhaps 10 GHz or more that will mean at least 10x more throughput and 10x less latency than today’s 5G,” Xiong explains. “It’s a crazy idea that bumps against the ceiling of material physics, but we’ve already started early research and we’re confident we can pull this off.” If successful, this project – known in the industry as “terahertz communications” – will cement the groundwork for 6G and beyond.

Persistence pays off: Every telecommunications carrier adopts the same wireless blueprint, which is why Xiong spends a lot of time extending Intel’s leadership and amplifying Intel’s voice in the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) – a worldwide consortium established in 1998 that sets unified protocols for mobile telecommunications. At these 3GPP meetings, “Intel, alongside our fellow travelers in the industry, will make our case for why our solutions are better,” he explains. In one memorable 3GPP meeting that ran five days with minimal breaks, Gary was able to win over a tough crowd. “We finally got Intel’s proposals adopted in advanced 5G specifications, which was immensely gratifying and very cool to see,” Xiong says.

‘We’ve only scratched the surface’: Despite working with invisible elements – wireless connectivity, waveforms and standards – Xiong remains passionate about his work. “We’ve only scratched the surface of what is possible,” he says, “and Intel has a ton more to contribute in this space.”

The post Intel’s 2020 Inventor of the Year Pushes Past Limits for Next-Gen Wireless appeared first on Intel Newsroom.

Intel Corporation’s first-quarter 2020 earnings news release and presentation are available on the company’s Investor Relations website. The earnings conference call for investors begins at 2 p.m. PDT today; a public webcast will be available at www.intc.com.

» Click for full infographic

The post Intel Reports First-Quarter 2020 Financial Results appeared first on Intel Newsroom.

By Todd Brady

The current situation in the world is unprecedented. Nearly every person on the planet is impacted in some way by the coronavirus and we are working together to combat it – individuals, businesses, governments and nonprofits. As someone who focuses every day in my role at Intel working on collective challenges like climate change and water scarcity, it is a dramatic example of the power of coming together to solve problems — whether acting at the community level or collaborating in global policy.

More: Using Artificial Intelligence to Save Coral Reefs

At Intel, we have long believed that climate change is a serious environmental, economic and social challenge that warrants an equally serious response by governments and the private sector. While it may not be experienced with the intense immediacy of a global pandemic, climate change is increasingly impacting all of us. The United Nations reports that one of the ways we’re experiencing climate change is through water, which has led to unpredictable supply, increased floods, prolonged droughts, impaired quality and depleted sources. More than 2 billion people live in places experiencing high water stress, resulting in food insecurity and limited access to clean water and sanitation.

Intel has focused on water conservation within our operations for decades. But in 2017, we took that commitment further, announcing our goal to restore 100% of our global water use. I’m proud to announce today – on Earth Day – that the projects we’ve supported have restored approximately 1 billion gallons of water to our local watersheds in the U.S. over the past two years. That’s enough water to support more than 9,000 U.S. homes for a year.

Our water management practices enable us to return 80% of the water we use back to our communities each year. The remaining 20% of our water use is consumed through evaporation or taken up by plants in irrigation. To advance our goal, we have funded 24 water restoration projects benefiting watersheds in Arizona, California, Oregon and New Mexico in the U.S. And we recently announced our first international project in Bengaluru, India. The projects are implemented with nonprofit partners, such as The Nature Conservancy, Trout Unlimited and National Forest Foundation, and include crop conversion, invasive species removal, irrigation improvements, stream and lake restoration, and much more.

Thirteen projects are actively restoring water. The remaining projects are in progress and will begin restoring water after completion in the next one to two years. These and future projects will restore an equivalent amount of water to what we consume, bringing the 80% up to 100% of our global water use that is returned or restored.

Conserving water within our operations will always be important, though it will never be enough. We call on other companies to join us in funding water restoration initiatives with the community leaders advancing this critical work. Life is about moving forward, always striving to improve – for Intel, that means not settling for what we have already achieved, but daring to dream bigger.

To learn more about the projects we are supporting and progress toward our goal, visit www.intel.com/water.

Todd Brady is the senior director of Global Public Affairs and Sustainability at Intel Corporation.

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What’s New: Today, on Earth Day 2020, Accenture, Intel and the Sulubaaï Environmental Foundation announced Project: CORaiL, an artificial intelligence (AI)-powered solution to monitor, characterize and analyze coral reef resiliency. Project: CORaiL was deployed in May 2019 to the reef surrounding Pangatalan Island in the Philippines and has collected about 40,000 images, which have been used by researchers to gauge reef health in real time.

“Project: CORaiL is an incredible example of how AI and edge technology can be used to assist researchers with monitoring and restoring the coral reef. We are very proud to partner with Accenture and the Sulubaaï Environmental Foundation on this important effort to protect our planet.”
–Rose Schooler, Intel corporate vice president in the Sales and Marketing Group

Why It Matters: Coral reefs are among the world’s most diverse ecosystems, with more than 800 species of corals providing habitat and shelter for approximately 25% of global marine life. Coral reefs are also extremely beneficial to humans: They protect coastlines from tropical storms, provide food and income for 1 billion people, and generate $9.6 billion in tourism and recreation each year. But according to the United Nations Environment Programme, coral reefs are endangered and rapidly degrading due to overfishing, bottom trawling, warming temperatures and unsustainable coastal development.

“Artificial intelligence provides unprecedented opportunities to solve some of society’s most vexing problems,” said Jason Mitchell, a managing director in Accenture’s Communications, Media & Technology practice. “Our ecosystem of corporate and social partners for this ‘AI for social good’ project proves that there is strength in numbers to make a positive environmental impact.”

How It Works: The abundance and diversity of fish serve as an important indicator of overall reef health. Traditional coral reef monitoring efforts involve human divers either directly collecting data underwater or manually capturing video footage and photos of the reef to be analyzed later. Those methods are widely trusted and employed, but they come with disadvantages: Divers can interfere with wildlife behavior and unintentionally affect survey results, and time underwater is limited as divers can often only take photos and video for around 30 minutes.

Engineers from Accenture, Sulubaaï and Intel combined their expertise for Project: CORaiL with the goal of helping researchers restore and supplement the existing degraded reef in the Philippines. First, they built a Sulu-Reef Prosthesis, a concrete underwater platform designed by Sulubaaï to provide strong support for unstable coral fragments. The Sulu-Reef Prosthesis incorporates fragments of living coral within it that will grow and expand, providing a hybrid habitat for fish and marine life. Then, they strategically placed intelligent underwater video cameras, equipped with the Accenture Applied Intelligence Video Analytics Services Platform (VASP) to detect and photograph fish as they pass. VASP uses AI to count and classify the marine life, with the data then sent to a surface dashboard, where it provides analytics and trends to researchers in real time, enabling them to make data-driven decisions to protect the coral reef.

“The value of your data depends on how quickly you can glean insights to make decisions from it,” said Athina Kanioura, Accenture’s chief analytics officer and Accenture Applied Intelligence lead. “With the ability to do real-time analysis on streaming video, VASP enables us to tap into a rich data source — in effect doing ‘hands on’ monitoring without disrupting the underwater environment.”

Accenture’s VASP solution is powered by Intel® Xeon® processors, Intel® FPGA Programmable Acceleration Cards, Intel® Movidius™ VPU and the Intel® Distribution of OpenVINO™ toolkit.

What’s Next: Engineers are at work on the next-generation Project: CORaiL prototype, which will include an optimized convolutional neural network and a backup power supply. They are also considering infrared cameras, which enable nighttime video capture to create a complete picture of the coral ecosystem. Additional uses could include studying the migration rate of tropical fish to colder waters and monitoring intrusion in protected or restricted underwater areas.

More Context: Intel FPGA Acceleration Hub | Artificial Intelligence at Intel | Intel Reaches 1 Billion Gallons of Water Restored

More Customer Stories: Intel Customer Spotlight on Intel.com | Customer Stories on Intel Newsroom

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The Intel® NUC 9 Extreme Kit is a new innovative modular form factor that gives consumers the ability to experience portable desktop performance in a small form factor. It is the first Intel NUC for gamers to support a 9th Gen Intel® Core™ i9 processor, an upgradeable Compute Element and a discrete dual-slot graphics card as large as 8 inches. The Intel NUC 9 Extreme Kit is built in a 5-liter chassis, making it one of the smallest gaming systems to support desktop-level discrete graphics.

Intel NUC Compute Elements incorporate an Intel processor, memory, connectivity and other components. This approach enables an industry standard for modular computing utilizing Intel® Architecture and standard computing technologies and interfaces.

More: All Intel Images

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What’s New: Today, Intel and Udacity announced the new Intel® Edge AI for IoT Developers Nanodegree Program to train the developer community in deep learning and computer vision, which will accelerate the development and deployment of artificial intelligence (AI) models at the edge by leveraging the Intel® Distribution of OpenVINO™ toolkit. Students who successfully complete the nanodegree program, estimated to take about three months, will receive a Udacity graduation certificate.

“Historically, students have learned how to build and deploy deep learning models for the cloud. With Udacity, we are training AI developers to go where the data is generated in the physical world: the edge. Optimizing direct deployment of models on edge devices requires knowledge of unique constraints like power, network bandwidth and latency, varying compute architectures and more. The skills this course delivers will allow developers – and companies that hire them – to implement learnings on real-world applications across a variety of fields.”
–Jonathan Ballon, Intel vice president and general manager, Internet of Things Group

Why It Matters: As industries like manufacturing, retail, healthcare and others increasingly develop computer vision and AI at the edge solutions for accurate and real-time insights, making sure the workforce has relevant skills to address the demands of these industries has become imperative. While the global edge computing market is forecast to reach $1.12 trillion by 2023, expanding at a compound annual growth rate of 32.6%, the workforce is not equipped to address industry demands.

“This program is part of Udacity’s commitment to provide training for 1 million developers worldwide,” said Gabe Dalporto, CEO of Udacity. “Our collaboration with Intel will open the doors for students to learn deployment of cutting-edge AI technologies at the edge and aid those with limited access to educational resources to grow in their fields.”

How It Works: To address the growing skills gap, Intel collaborated with Udacity to create the Intel Edge AI for IoT Developers Nanodegree Program. Students will have the opportunity to complete three real-world projects, each reviewed and approved by Udacity’s reviewer network. Students who successfully complete the nanodegree program will receive a certification from Udacity and have a practitioner-level skill set in delivering AI at the edge.

For those unable to commit to the full nanodegree program, the Intel® Edge AI Fundamentals with OpenVINO™ course includes a free subset of the content from the program. This course does not include projects or technical mentor support, but it offers in-depth knowledge on how to develop AI solutions for the edge.

About Scholarships for the Intel Edge AI for IoT Developers Nanodegree Program: In November, Intel and Udacity launched the Intel Edge AI Fundamentals Course. The top 850 students who completed the 2.5-month fundamentals course were today awarded nanodegree scholarships. Twenty-five of the scholarship winners were from Women Who Code’s Portland, Oregon, chapter.

About the Intel Edge AI for IoT Developers Nanodegree Program: The nanodegree program will introduce students to the Intel OpenVINO toolkit, which allows developers to deploy pre-trained deep learning models through a high-level C++ or Python inference engine API integrated with application logic. Based on convolutional neural networks, the OpenVINO toolkit allows graduates to maximize application performance across a range of heterogeneous Intel architectures to deliver fast, efficient deep learning workloads. Anyone working for a company can also take advantage of Intel DevCloud for the Edge to develop, test and run their workloads on a cluster of the latest Intel hardware and software.

Students can sign up for the course via Udacity.

More Context: Intel® Edge AI Scholarship Program | The Intel Edge AI for IoT Developers Nanodegree Program Now Open for Enrollment (Udacity Blog) | Intel’s Edge AI OpenVINO (Part 1) (Blog) | Udacity Intel Edge AI Scholars 2k20 (Blog Series)

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Intel Corporation has invented a spin qubit fabrication flow on its 300 mm process technology using isotopically pure wafers like this one. (Credit: Walden Kirsch/Intel Corporation)
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What’s New: Intel, in collaboration with QuTech, today published a paper in Nature demonstrating the successful control of “hot” qubits, the fundamental unit of quantum computing, at temperatures greater than 1 kelvin. The research also highlighted individual coherent control of two qubits with single-qubit fidelities of up to 99.3%. These breakthroughs highlight the potential for cryogenic controls of a future quantum system and silicon spin qubits, which closely resemble a single electron transistor, to come together in an integrated package.

“This research represents a meaningful advancement in our research into silicon spin qubits, which we believe are promising candidates for powering commercial-scale quantum systems, given their resemblance to transistors that Intel has been manufacturing for more than 50 years. Our demonstration of hot qubits that can operate at higher temperatures while maintaining high fidelity paves the way to allow a variety of local qubit control options without impacting qubit performance.”
–Jim Clarke, director of quantum hardware, Intel Labs

Why It’s Important: Applying quantum computing to practical problems hinges on the ability to scale to and control thousands – if not millions – of qubits at the same time with high levels of fidelity. However, current quantum systems designs are limited by overall system size, qubit fidelity and especially the complexity of control electronics required to manage the quantum at large scale.

Having the control electronics and spin qubits integrated on the same chip greatly simplifies the interconnects between the two. But increasing the temperatures at which the qubits can operate is critical to advancing that goal. Previously, a quantum computer was only proven to operate in the millikelvin range – just a fraction of a degree above absolute zero. Now, with this research into hot qubits, QuTech – in partnership with Intel – has proven its hypothesis that silicon spin qubits have the potential to operate at slightly higher temperatures than current quantum systems, achieving just one step towards scalability.

The approach enables Intel to leverage its expertise in advanced packaging and interconnect technologies for a scalable path forward toward quantum practicality.   This research builds on Intel’s ongoing work in advancing the development of full-stack quantum systems, including the introduction late last year of the first-of-its-kind Horse Ridge cryogenic quantum control chip.

About Key Featured Breakthroughs: Quantum information stored in such qubits is normally quickly lost unless the qubits are cooled to near absolute zero (-273 degrees Celsius or 0 kelvin). In research highlighted in Nature, Intel and QuTech have for the first time demonstrated the operation of qubits that are hot, dense and coherent. These compact qubits function at high quality and at relatively high temperatures.

While single-qubit control above 1 K with silicon quantum dots is demonstrated simultaneously with this work, control of two qubits was only achievable until now at a reduced temperature of 40 millikelvins. Intel’s research with QuTech shows full two-qubit logic in a quantum circuit operating at 1.1 K.

Through this research, Intel and QuTech have also demonstrated the ability to control the electron spin of a two-qubit system measuring single-qubit fidelities of up to 99.3% and accurate tunability of the system. Further, the team has illustrated that performance of spin qubits is minimally affected in the temperature ranges of 45 millikelvin to 1.25 kelvin.

More Context: Quantum Computing at Intel | Intel Labs | Hot, dense and coherent: scalable quantum bits operate under practical conditions (QuTech News Release)

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TEL AVIV, Israel, April 14, 2020 – Intel Ignite, Intel’s startup growth program in Israel, today announced the 10 startups selected for its second cohort, which is scheduled to begin April 19. In response to the coronavirus, Intel Ignite also announced that the program will be conducted entirely online until people can safely return to work.

Choosing from more than 200 applicants, 70 startups were interviewed for two to three hours each. Sixteen were shortlisted, with 10 startups ultimately selected. More than 50 Intel executives and technical leaders, top venture capitalists (VCs), entrepreneurs and ecosystem influencers helped with the interviews and final selection.

More: Intel Announces Program for Israeli Startups Targeting Tech Inflections

During the 12-week program, each startup will be assigned an industry mentor, with whom it will conduct weekly virtual meetings. The virtual program will include sales and marketing workshops, culture and team building, networking, and coaching sessions with industry experts, including sessions on how to work through challenging economic situations. The mentor entrepreneurs will speak to the startups about crisis management and their takeaways for successfully managing and building companies regardless of the challenges.

The new cohort consists of a range of seed startups, each with an average funding of more than $5 million. The companies in the second cohort are:

• Aspecto helps development teams solve production issues before they evolve, using deep API analysis. The company’s approach is to automate tasks based on real production data.
• Chain Reaction enables enterprise blockchain adoption by solving the scale and security barriers. Its cloud-based hardware infrastructure enables enterprise-grade privacy-enabled blockchain systems.
• ClassiQ tackles the most urgent and complex challenges in quantum computing development. The company bridges the gap between complex quantum logic and real-world applications.
• Compira Labs leverages next-generation congestion control and machine learning to prevent poor quality video streaming. The technology is used by content distribution networks and over-the-top video providers.
• Deepchecks monitors artificial intelligence (AI) systems, helping organizations with various aspects of controlling their AI systems, including monitoring, predicting failures and identifying root cause issues.
• Hyro creates plug-and-play conversational AI assistants for enterprises by seamlessly consolidating information on their websites and databases without the use of any integrations, playbooks or training data from customers.
• Indoor Robotics developed an autonomous platform for indoor navigation and operation of robots. Its holistic solution performs active monitoring on the premises for early detection of hazards. A cloud-based AI anomaly detection software provides further analysis of events.
• OneView allows scalable and efficient analysis of satellite imagery by utilizing virtual synthetic data optimized for machine learning algorithm training.
• Shopic created the world’s first frictionless checkout platform using AI, which fits medium to large grocery stores. It provides line-free checkout, while eliminating incidents of fraud and increasing sales. Its platform also collects advanced analytics for retailers, providing information on stock levels, missing items and more.
• Valid Networks blends the best practices of traditional application security in dApps software development. Its proprietary technology utilizes advanced machine learning algorithms and code verification techniques.

“We are very excited to have such an incredible group of startups participating in our second cohort,” said Tzahi (Zack) Weisfeld, Intel Ignite general manager. “The global situation is confronting us with a new reality, and we are looking to help startups overcome their challenges. Startups are in real need for experienced advice and guidance. This is the time to do everything in our power to help them.”

About Intel Ignite

Intel® Ignite is a 12-week program for 10 diverse and impressive early-stage startups that will receive hands-on mentorship from Intel and world-leading experts. The companies will gain access to technology and business leaders, a preferred path to the best investors, as well as the knowledge, resources, and association that comes with being accepted into one of the world’s most challenging and competitive startup programs. For information, visit www.intel.com/ignite.

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