If the choices made by company boards of administrators can point out the place an organization desires to be focusing, Amazon’s board simply made an attention-grabbing transfer. The corporate introduced on Thursday that Andrew Ng, identified for constructing AI at giant tech firms, is becoming a member of its board of administrators. The corporate additionally mentioned that Judy McGrath — finest identified for her work as a long-time TV govt, working MTV and serving to Viacom grow to be a media powerhouse — might be stepping down as a director.
Taken collectively, the 2 strikes sketch out an attention-grabbing image of the tech big’s intentions.
After many pricey years of going all out on constructing an leisure empire (Amazon spent virtually $19 billion on its video and music enterprise in 2023), it’s attention-grabbing to see that McGrath, who would have been an essential advocate and adviser on that technique, isn’t going to face for reelection.
That’s under no circumstances to say that Amazon will stop to be an enormous drive in streaming leisure, be it video, music, gaming or the rest. The corporate is now folding in promoting throughout Prime Video, which is one massive cause it could wish to hold its viewers comfortable and coming again.
Nonetheless, will probably be attention-grabbing to see how investments play out in that phase in 2024. The corporate has laid off lots of of staff in its studio and video divisions, and it has additionally been winding down Prime Video in some areas, which can point out that the enterprise may very well be smaller, or not less than extra centered, going ahead. And given the AI whiplash that each Massive Tech firm is presently coping with, it feels well timed that McGrath is stepping away from the board now.
On that be aware, to remain on the forefront of tech, Amazon might be searching for higher thought management on the subsequent steps in its synthetic intelligence technique.
It’s value remembering that Amazon has been a number one participant in AI for a very long time. Its Alexa assistant and Echo units helped put voice recognition and related assistants on the map; the corporate has been engaged on autonomous companies, for in airborne and ground-level supply in addition to in-store buying; it makes use of machine studying to enhance how merchandise are focused; AWS is a giant participant in AI compute; and now it’s pouring billions into investments in massive AI startups.
But, for not less than a yr, within the wake of OpenAI’s GPT developments, Amazon has grappled with the impression internally and externally that it’s “falling behind” on the know-how.
Is it true? Is it simply optics? Whatever the reply, Ng’s appointment can solely be useful for advancing Amazon’s profile within the realm of AI. Put merely, the corporate desires, and believes it wants, to make actual innovation within the area. Andy Jassy, in Amazon’s annual letter to shareholders, revealed shortly after the Ng announcement, went as far as to name GenAI Amazon’s fourth “pillar” (alongside Market, Prime and AWS) when it comes to future focus. That requires critical, high-level course on make extra than simply follow-on strikes.
Ng is doubtlessly a triple-threat board appointment: He has expertise in academia, investing, and hands-on constructing, and he has normally dealt with all three roles concurrently. He’s presently an adjunct professor at Stanford; a normal accomplice at a enterprise studio known as AI Fund; and he heads edtech firm DeepLearning.AI and is the founding father of laptop imaginative and prescient startup Touchdown AI. Oh, and he’s additionally chair of Coursera, one other edtech startup he based and used to guide.
Ng has additionally served because the chief scientist and VP at Chinese language search big Baidu; and he based and led Google Mind, which was that search big’s first massive foray into constructing and making use of AI tech throughout its merchandise.
Amazon didn’t present any assertion from Ng in its announcement. We’ve reached out to him immediately, and we’ll replace when and if we hear again.
It could really feel like a brand new wave of firms and thinkers are setting the tempo in AI, however the Amazons of the world are actually not standing by idly.
