Global X Funds, the New York-based provider of exchange-traded funds (ETFs), today launched the Global X FinTech Thematic ETF (Nasdaq: FINX), the Global X Robotics & Artificial Intelligence Thematic ETF (Nasdaq: BOTZ), and the Global X Internet of Things Thematic ETF (Nasdaq: SNSR). The three new ETFs join Global X's Thematic suite, which now has fifteen funds and approximately 1 billion in assets under management as of September 6, 2016. Global X's Thematic suite includes funds that have been available to investors since 2010. The Global X Internet of Things Thematic ETF aims to offer exposure to companies that stand to potentially benefit from the broader adoption of the Internet of Things (IoT). This includes the development and manufacturing of semiconductors and sensors, integrated products and solutions, and applications serving smart grids, smart homes, connected cars, and the industrial Internet.

It is used to disguise a person's identity, cover explicit areas of an image or to render vehicle number plates unreadable. But deliberate pixilation of photographs could soon be rendered useless by artificial intelligence that can peer through the blurring to see what is hidden beneath. Software engineers have used machine learning to teach a piece of software to adapt image recognition techniques to recognise objects, faces and words in obscured images. Artificial intelligence could be used to defeat attempts to protect people's identity (stock image) or hide certain information in videos and photographs posted online. The software could mean that people who appear on Google Street View, for example, could be identified despite attempts by the search company to hide their identity with image blurring. It is a bizarre disappearing act that only the most affluent seem to be able to afford.

Amazon has confirmed its virtual assistant Echo speakers are coming to the UK and Germany. Until now, the company sold its voice-controlled devices only in the US. The machines can answer questions, control other internet-connected devices, build shopping lists and link in to dozens of third-party services including Spotify, Uber and BBC News. Experts say they appeal to early adopters' sense of curiosity but tend to be a harder sell to others. Amazon told a press conference in London that the devices would become available in the two European countries on 28 September.

Nasa has announced that it has found evidence of flowing water on Mars. Scientists have long speculated that Recurring Slope Lineae -- or dark patches -- on Mars were made up of briny water but the new findings prove that those patches are caused by liquid water, which it has established by finding hydrated salts. Several hundred camped outside the London store in Covent Garden. The 6s will have new features like a vastly improved camera and a pressure-sensitive "3D Touch" display

Nasa has announced that it has found evidence of flowing water on Mars. Scientists have long speculated that Recurring Slope Lineae -- or dark patches -- on Mars were made up of briny water but the new findings prove that those patches are caused by liquid water, which it has established by finding hydrated salts. Several hundred camped outside the London store in Covent Garden. The 6s will have new features like a vastly improved camera and a pressure-sensitive "3D Touch" display

Datorama, a marketing startup that wants to "tame" your business data, announced today that it scored a 32 million investment led by Lightspeed Venture Partners. The New York-based startup aims use the new capital to "accelerate the company's research and development in the artificial intelligence field; which will further elevate its machine learning capabilities." "In this next stage we're going to focus on the further development of our best-in-breed solution, and we're going to continue to push the boundaries of machine learning and how it's applied in the marketing analytics capacity," said Datorama CEO and cofounder Ran Sarig. Marker LLC and Innovation Endeavors also participated. The series C investment brings Datorama to a total of 50 million in funds.

Microsoft researchers have reached a milestone in the quest for computers to understand speech as well as humans. Xuedong Huang, the company's chief speech scientist, reports that in a recent benchmark evaluation against the industry standard Switchboard speech recognition task, Microsoft researchers achieved a word error rate (WER) of 6.3 percent, the lowest in the industry. In a research paper published Tuesday, the scientists said: "Our best single system achieves an error rate of 6.9% on the NIST 2000 Switchboard set. We believe this is the best performance reported to date for a recognition system not based on system combination. This past weekend, at Interspeech, an international conference on speech communication and technology held in San Francisco, IBM said it has achieved a WER of 6.6 percent. Twenty years ago, the error rate of the best published research system had a WER of greater than 43 percent. "This new milestone benefited from a wide range of new technologies ...

You don't need an infinite number of monkeys to type out the complete works of William Shakespeare. What you need, according to a team of researchers from Stanford University, is one monkey equipped with a brain implant that allows it to interface with a computer. In a new experiment described in the journal IEEE, researchers were able to use a brain-computer interface (BCI) to enable thought-controlled typing at a rate of up to 12 words a minute -- the highest brain-based typing rate ever achieved. In the experiment conducted on two rhesus macaques, the animals were able to transcribe passages from Hamlet and the New York Times. "Our results demonstrate that this interface may have great promise for use in people. "It enables a typing rate sufficient for a meaningful conversation."

The unprecedented rise of AI is challenging the competitiveness of every industry across the world, offering to all the leaders the opportunity to make their existing processes and businesses more efficient! Even more, we can now be able to predict that the next decade is going to be mark by an endless wave of disruptions, giving to the AI's companies the potential to become tomorrow's leaders. In order to explore the unlimited potential of AI market and understand how companies are implementing AI in their businesses, the editorial team of AI Europe has been thrilled to interview a major leader of this cognitive industry: Peter Wallqvist, CEO, RAVN Systems! http://bit.ly/2cfr6Rl

Slaughter and May has signed a deal to use a new artificial intelligence (AI) system called Luminance which it helped create with backing from a technology investment company set up by Autonomy co-founder Mike Lynch. The firm worked closely with Luminance Technologies, which has been funded with capital from Invoke Capital, for several months to test and pilot the software Luminance claims will transform the due diligence process on M&A deals. The elite magic circle firm is the only law firm to have piloted Luminance prior to its launch, though several others are also interested in piloting the technology. Its expertise on deals and due diligence was used to help improve the technology. Slaughters has signed a contract to use the technology going forward, though the details around this are not yet clear.