Indian IT major Tech Mahindra has partnered with the Global Climate Action Summit (GCAS) to launch ‘AI4Action', a global artificial intelligence (AI) challenge aimed at finding solutions for climate change. Under ‘AI4Action' competition, both the firms would challenge students from schools and colleges, universities and corporates in four major cities – San Francisco, New York, London and New Delhi – to come up with creative AI-powered applications over the next year to tackle climate issues impacting the environment.
Tech Mahindra and GCAS said that they would select ten finalists that can demonstrate tangible solutions for climate action. “The overall winner must present an actionable idea that can be transformed into a real-world solution in time for the United Nations Climate Summit in 2019,” said Tech Mahindra in a statement.
“This challenge mobilizes some of the brightest minds, utilizing the most advanced technology, to imagine – and pursue – solutions to the climate crisis that do not even exist today,” said California Governor Edmund G. Brown Jr.
Tech Mahindra will supply an open source AI platform, Acumos, co-developed with AT&T and hosted by the Linux Foundation, that will allow ‘AI4Action' participants to build, share and deploy their AI-driven models for tackling climate change. Acumos will provide a collaborative marketplace for accessing, using and enhancing AI models and software. Developers and businesses will be able to use the platform to string together individual applications to create complex and sophisticated AI services.
“The world has a historic opportunity to reboot future development with de-carbonised, climate compliant technologies. AI will be a powerful new tool in the fight against climate change and the more businesses that get behind this technology, the faster we can all transition to a cleaner, more energy efficient economy. Tech Mahindra's AI4Action initiative along with the global partners is a step in the right direction,” said Anand Mahindra, Chairman, Mahindra Group.
Linux Foundation Executive Director, Jim Zemlin, said, “The potential uses for AI are limitless, and taking advantage of this rapidly advancing technology to address climate change – an issue that affects us all – is the best use case I can envision. The Linux Foundation is proud to support this important initiative. We are thrilled to see the Acumos AI project leveraged for such a positive purpose through the AI4Action challenge.”
