Google has now acquired Halli Labs, a 4-month-old AI (Artificial Intelligence) and ML (Machine Learning) startup. It is an Indian startup based in Bangalore. The acquisition was announced by Halli Labs in a blog post yesterday. Full details of the acquisition are not known yet.
Welcome @Pankaj and the team at @halli_labs to Google. Looking forward to building some cool stuff together. https://t.co/wiBP1aQxE9
— Caesar Sengupta (@caesars) July 12, 2017
VP of Product Management at Google, Caesar Sengupta tweeted late Wednesday, confirming the acquisition. The deal is signed for an undisclosed amount. Google is deeply focussing on strengthening its AI and ML base for the increasing number of users especially in India. Hally Labs can provide Google with some essentials to expand AI base.
What is Halli Labs?
Excited to share that the @halli_labs team is joining @Google. https://t.co/RHxmXKKxZR
— 𝚙𝚗𝚔𝚓.𝚎𝚝𝚑 (@pankaj) July 12, 2017
Halli (meaning Village in Kannada) Labs is a Bangalore-based startup that is described to apply Machine Learning to old problems and domains. The company also works on Artificial Intelligence (AI), Natural Language Processing (NLP) and Deep Learning.
The startup was founded last year in April by Pankaj Gupta, who is an alumnus of IIT Delhi and holds a PhD. in Computer Science from Stanford University.
Why did Google Acquire Halli Labs?
Google is working aggressively on their AI and Machine Learning portfolio to expand their IoT ecosystem. Between 2013-15, Google signed deals with DeepMind Technologies, Jetpac, and Dark Blue Labs – all three were based on AI. Halli Labs is the latest addition to Google’s list of acquisitions.
Also, for expanding their AI and ML based ecosystem in India, Google may be focussing on an India-based company to provide the essential data and core algorithms.
Services based on AI and ML
Google Assistant is one example of Artificial Intelligence. AI is also responsible for Fraud Detection, recommendations and much more. Coming to Machine learning, it can be used for healthcare and diagnosis. AI and ML can work hand-in-hand to provide faster and more efficient daily activities.
