Drawing on the work of a clever cadre of academic researchers, the biggest names in tech--including Google, Facebook, Microsoft, and Apple--are embracing a more powerful form of AI known as "deep learning," using it to improve everything from speech recognition and language translation to computer vision, the ability to identify images without human help. In this new AI order, the general assumption is that Google is out in front. The company now employs the researcher at the heart of the deep-learning movement, the University of Toronto's Geoff Hinton. It has openly discussed the real-world progress of its new AI technologies, including the way deep learning has revamped voice search on Android smartphones. And these technologies hold several records for accuracy in speech recognition and computer vision.

Microsoft Research "lets the dogs out" on stage during Harry Shum's 2014 Faculty Summit keynote.

Project Adam is a new deep-learning system modeled after the human brain that has greater image classification accuracy and is 50 times faster than other systems in the industry.