Facebook says that the new AI-powered translation is 11 percent more accurate than the old-school approach, which is what they call a "phrase-based machine translation" technique that wasn't powered by neural networks. That system translated words or small groups of words individually, and didn't do a good job of considering the context or word order of the sentence. As an example of the difference between the two translation systems, Facebook demonstrated how the old approach would have translated a sentence from Turkish into English, and then showed how the new AI-powered system would do it. The first Turkish-to-English sentence reads this way: "Their, Izmir's why you said no we don't expect them to understand." Now check out the newer translation: "We don't expect them to understand why Izmir said no." Notice how the AI fixed the mistakes in word and phrase order?

Tech giants including Baidu and Google spent between $20B to $30B on AI in 2016, with 90% of this spent on R&D and deployment, and 10% on AI acquisitions. Artificial Intelligence (AI) investment has turned into a race for patents and intellectual property (IP) among the world's leading tech companies. U.S.-based companies absorbed 66% of all AI investments in 2016. China was second with 17% and growing fast. By providing better search results, Netflix estimates that it is avoiding canceled subscriptions that would reduce its revenue by $1B annually.

Brazil forward Neymar said he needed a new challenge, as he joined Paris St-Germain from Barcelona for a world record fee of 222m euros (£200m). The 25-year-old won seven major trophies in his four seasons at the Nou Camp, including the Champions League once and La Liga twice. He said his father, Neymar Sr, wanted him to stay at Barcelona. "I have won all that a player can win," said Neymar, who will earn 45m euros (£40.7m) a year on a five-year deal. Writing on Instagram, he added: "I have conquered everything an athlete can conquer. I have lived unforgettable moments. But a player [me] needs challenges. "And for the second time in my life, I'll contradict my father." Neymar's transfer smashes the previous record set when Paul Pogba returned to Manchester United from Juventus for £89m in August 2016. His £782,000-a-week wages mean PSG's total outlay is £400m. The French side have called a news conference for 12:30 BST on Friday, and Neymar will be introduced to fans at PSG's first game of the season against Amiens at Parc des Princes on Saturday. PSG reached the last eight of the Champions League last season - knocked out by a Neymar-inspired Barcelona - and were beaten to the French title by Monaco. Neymar said he has joined "one of the most ambitious clubs in Europe". "Paris St-Germain's ambition attracted me to the club, along with the passion and the energy this brings," he added. "I feel ready to take the challenge.

NAGOYA – Toyota Motor Corp. and Mazda Motor Corp. are set to form a capital alliance to boost joint development of electric vehicles, sources close to the matter said Friday. Japan's largest carmaker is mulling taking a roughly 5 percent stake in Mazda, while Mazda may also invest in Toyota, the sources said. The two automakers are expected to announce the plan later in the day. Toyota is scheduled to release its earnings results for the April-June period on Friday afternoon. Global carmakers are facing growing costs to comply with stricter emission and other environmental regulations.

In a few years, robotic farming equipment will be able to plow and prepare soil while human farmers sleep. That is what Hokkaido University professor Noboru Noguchi and his team are aiming for as the nation's farmers age, with no successors in place. The improved use of robotics in agriculture will not only reduce manual labor but will enable aging farmers to continue working and focus their time and energy on areas that require their knowledge and experience. The related technology has been advancing in recent years. Machinery that allows a driver to sit back while it plows the field in straight lines is already on the market.

Artificial intelligence, more commonly known under AI acronym, has become a very hot topic these days. Forrester Research forecasts a 300 percent growth of AI investment this year. Toyota invests $100 million in fund for AI, UBS is trying to bring AI to its investment bank's operations, while VCs frivolously dream of replacing all of us with AI to cut costs. Some people even feel embarrassed because they have never used or implemented AI in their office or home. Obviously, many cybersecurity vendors leverage the term in an attempt to increase sales and impress their customers.

AI refers to systems that act intelligently, whether in a specific domain (narrow AI), or in general (strong AI). Designing such systems is no easy task. The human brain, consisting of about 86 billion neurons, has been postulated to be the most complex object in the known universe; naturally, recreating even a portion of that complexity has proven to be challenging. Does this mean the current interest in AI is just the latest in a series of hype cycles? Consider these recent AI accomplishments: in 2011, IBM's question-answering Watson program bested Jeopardy!

Robotic process automation (RPA) is a family of technologies designed to replicate human actions in order to complete a task or series of tasks. Unlike traditional programming constructs, RPA is designed to allow everyday workers to quickly deploy virtual counterparts to learn from and mimic the actions they use to accomplish routine tasks, therefore freeing the worker to handle more complex, and in some cases, more fulfilling work activities. According to a new report from Tractica, the market for RPA is developing rapidly, and the market intelligence firm forecasts that worldwide revenue in the sector will increase from $151 million in 2016 to more than $5.1 billion by 2025. The key industry sectors that are embracing RPA implementations include financial services & banking, utilities & telecommunications, retail & commercial, and healthcare & insurance. The market opportunity for RPA will be largest in Europe during the forecast period, with Asia Pacific and North America not far behind.

If you follow the business press at all, by now you're probably overwhelmed with articles on AI (artificial intelligence). AI is definitely a hot topic in the technology industry. According to CB Insights, in 2016 over 550 AI-related startups raised over $5 billion in funding. AI is also very relevant in another industry buzzword, IoT (Internet of Things). AI-driven technologies are an essential tool in helping organizations make sense of and, perhaps more importantly, make decisions from the ever-increasing torrent of data flowing from connected devices.

Imagine a world where the inanimate objects of the shipping industry could talk. What would today's ships tell us about the stress overweight containers place on their hulls? How would they describe the strain they are put under by certain weather conditions? And how would they express the real impact of slow steaming on their superstructure? It sounds the stuff of science fiction, but "talking" ships could be just a few years away.