Google has been working to marry its new-found focus on generative AI with its existing expertise in search since mid-May, as part of Search Lab's Google Search Generative Experience (SGE) project. On Wednesday, the company announced that the SGE program is expanding beyond America's digital borders and into both the Japanese and Indian marketplaces. SGE is Google's answer to Microsoft's Bing AI and is designed to provide summarized and curated answers to input prompts rather than a list of webpages. Google's system differs from Microsoft's in that it incorporates its AI directly into the existing search bar rather than run it as a separate chatbot assistant. The company began expanding access to the SGE program in late May for US users and, this week, rolled out Search Labs to users in India and Japan.

The next level of strategic cooperation between India and Japan has become apparent with the news that India and Japan are to work together to introduce artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics in the defence sector. Chatting with Indian media last month, said, "You should expect to see increased bilateral cooperation between us (India and Japan) to develop unmanned ground vehicles (UGV) and robotics." This cooperation is important considering the increasingly aggressive stance by China and China's assistance to Pakistan in terms of AI and robotics. Recent reports indicate China has secretly sold its Wing Loong-I strike-capable medium-altitude, 5000 km range, 200 kg payload drone to Pakistan. Wing Loong-I is China's latest armed drone that conducted firing exercises during January 2018.

NEW DELHI: India and Japan will work together to introduce artificial intelligence and robotics in the defence sector, the next level of strategic cooperation between the two Asian partners. Kentaro Sonoura, Japan's state minister for foreign affairs and a close adviser to PM Shinzo Abe, told TOI in an exclusive chat, "You should expect to see increased bilateral cooperation between us to develop unmanned ground vehicles (UGV) and robotics." The strategic sphere is where the bulk of India-Japan convergence lies. After the nuclear agreement was ratified by the Japanese parliament late 2017, Sonoura said India and Japan would be setting up a joint task force for commercial agreements by the end of January. With the legislation behind them, the Japanese minister said Tokyo was keen to get this going.

Amazon has been on quite an expansion push with its smart home speaker line recently, but now it's clear that they're increasing more than just the number of Echo devices on the market. The company announced today that Echo and Alexa are now available in India by invitation only, and they'll expand to Japan later this year. Devices will start shipping in India this month. According to Tom Taylor, the SVP of Amazon Alexa, the company will also open the Alexa Skills Kit and Alexa Voice Service in order to allow developers to create customized software for Indian and Japanese customers. Hardware makers will also have the freedom to build devices that can work with Alexa.