Google acquires neural net University of Toronto spin-out DNNresearch.

The internet giant Google has acquired DNNresearch, a spin-out from the University of Toronto for its research into deep neural networks for an unspecified sum. Canada-based DNNresearch was founded last year, and is developing research that will impact on areas such as speech recognition, computer vision, and understanding language. Google previously backed Professor Geoffrey Hinton and his team from the Department of Computer Science at Toronto with a $600k gift. “I am extremely excited about this fantastic opportunity to keep my research here in Toronto and, at the same time, help Google apply new developments in deep learning to make systems that help people,” said Professor Hinton. The deal will also see two of Hinton’s graduate students, who helped him set up DNNresearch, move to Google following the development of a “state of the art” system that aids in object recognition. 

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