Knowledge Jun 26, 2024 Trend Report: GenAI Summit San Fransisco 2024

The GenAI Summit is an international event dedicated to generative AI and was held in San Fransisco, CA. This year (2024) was the inaugural event. The event's purpose is to promote responsible development and use of generative AI. Government officials as well as corporate officers, representatives from startups, investors, engineers, researchers, and students all participated. In particular, CEOs accounted for 23% of the total attendance for this event, followed by computer engineers with 21%.

At the summit, there were introductions to the latest research and products in the field of generative AI through workshops and group sessions. In this Trend Report, I would like to introduce some of the notable startups that I found at the GenAI Summit this year.

Robot dogs and humanoid robots were on display from Unitree Robotics. The robot dog Unitree Go2 can stand on two legs or climb stairs while doing a handstand with only its front legs.

It is also equipped with ChatGPT, which uses AI to understand the surrounding environment and make decisions. They are also conducting joint research with Stanford University and the University of Tokyo to further advance the technology. Among the many exhibitors, it was probably the product that attracted the most attention.  The price when it comes to market will start at $1,600.

LUOBOT, also based in China, manufactures service robots and provided robot baristas for commercial use at this event. The robot barista could brew both coffee and tea. The coffee served by robots at this event was actually priced higher than the coffee sold at the stand manned by humans (many attendees found some humor in this).

Groq is a startup that develops next-generation high-performance LPU (Language Processing Unit) chips which are specially designed for use with generative AI.  It dramatically speeds up the user's communication with generative AI applications (e.g. it can output 500 tokens in 1 second, which is about 25 times faster than GPT-4). Although the output in Japanese is still inferior to other companies, it may well attract attention as a gamechanger in the field of generative AI in the future.

That is it for this month’s Trend Report!

KDDI Open Innovation Fund will continue to discover next generation startups that will create a better future for all.

KDDI America, Inc.

 KDDI America is the US subsidiary of KDDI Corporation, a Fortune Global 500 company and is growing communications carrier with a proven track record in Japan and a longstanding reputation for quality and reliability. KDDI America provides a wide range of High Quality Services such as Communications, Data Centers and Solution Services throughout the world.