Panasonic may buy artificial intelligence companies for mobile technology - The Economic Times

NEW DELHI: Panasonic India is scouting for companies to acquire in the next 6-9 months to develop artificial intelligence (AI) and Machine learning technologies, which it wants to integrate with its future smartphones to differentiate from rival vendors in the crowded yet fast growing market. The handset vendor has already set aside an initial corpus of 10 million for the development of this technology through a merger and acquisition or a joint venture. "The budget is in tune of 10 million to start with, and as we see progress on this front and things go in right direction, then there will be no constraint on the budget part. We can spend as high as possible. Some part of this budget has been generated from the India business, while some portion has been allocated from Japan," Pankaj Rana, head of mobility division, India, South Asia, Middle East and Africa at Panasonic, told ET. "Our team would be traveling to Silicon Valley soon. We will have new products ready with AI in 9-12 months. In the last three months, we have finalized what we will do and budgets have been allocated from Panasonic Japan and Panasonic India. Now we have to find a partner and start working on timeline, while understanding the market," he said.