IBM and SoftBank are teaming up to teach IBM's Watson supercomputer Japanese, taking intelligent robotics to the next level.
Watson has generated plenty of interest so far, and not just because the robot is a Jeopardy expert. Watson can organize and handle whopping amounts of data, including clinical tests and legal regulations.
The partnership between IBM and SoftBank, which brings Watson to Japan, heralds an era of technological development that further advances robotics with artificial intelligence. At the same time, this deal is a stepping stone to a new market.
IBM says that Japanese researchers as well as clients and prospects are excited about Watson's potential applications in a range of areas, from robotics to education, and from elder care to wealth management and beyond.
"It shouldn't be surprising, really. Artificial Intelligence, humanoid robots, facial recognition — all of these things have a long and rich history in Japan," said Michael Karasick, head of innovation for the IBM Watson team. "That type of curiosity and knack for exploration make us think there's real business for Watson in Japan."
With the help of SoftBank, IBM wants to endow Watson with cognitive capabilities that could enable the supercomputer to recognize the most important information from a large data set, or even express sympathy. In time, this could also pave the way to the use of more advanced cognitive technologies in other markets.
SoftBank subsidiary SoftBank Telecom will be in charge of distributing the IBM technology in Japan, as well as hiring developers to create new products and features using the technology.
IBM notes in a press release that learning new languages is not important just for humans. The company believes that expanding Watson's linguistic ability "beyond English fluency" could maximize the supercomputer's impact worldwide. Being a polyglot should significantly widen the cognitive computing system's horizons.
In addition to English, its "native" language, Watson has also learned Spanish, French, Portuguese, Arabic and some Armenian. Japanese is a challenging language to learn, but we think it's safe to say that Watson is more than up for the task.
