AI ecosystem builder Skymind's collaboration with the Ministry of Health in Malaysia is the first step to build a global research community with a focus on how #AI can better position people to weather pandemics. Skymind Holdings Limited's Shawn Tan says Skymind is committed to the long haul in building Malaysia and the Southeast Asia region as an AI hub for the world, concluding that: "Commitment unlocks the doors of imagination." The following feature takes a behind-the-scenes look at how frontier technologies can try and balance data privacy concerns and the current state of AI in the health crisis.

Following the opening of its London office in January this year, artificial intelligence (#AI) technology incubator and investor Skymind Global Ventures (SGV) announced a $800m fund to boost the AI #ecosystems in #Europe and #Asia.

The AnyLogic Conference 2019 made clear how simulation modeling continues to empower all kinds of industries from all around the world. The exciting progress being made in machine learning and its strengthening relationship with simulation also featured strongly throughout the event. Here we have gathered the presentations for download and also posted some photos! Simulation experts and machine learning specialists from across industries assembled in Austin, Texas, April 17-18, to share their insights and demonstrate innovative ideas. With a combination of presentations, workshops, and a panel discussion, they did not disappoint.

Artificial Intelligence has been spreading its wings since 1950s but has been increasingly hogging limelight in recent times. Leaders of the world's most influential technology firms including Amazon, Facebook, Microsoft, Google are emphasizing their enthusiasm for Artificial Intelligence (AI) and its applicability. AI has become more popular today thanks to increased data volumes, advanced algorithms, and improvements in computing power and storage. Artificial intelligence is poised to have a huge impact in automating business processes including streamlining efficiency and anticipating barriers to growth. There is growing interest in AI, ML and DL, and the field is getting immense popularity amongst classes and masses.

In response to changes in industry, there are changes to this year's AnyLogic Conference. In a way, this mirrors the relationship developing between simulation and machine learning – each benefitting from the input and feedback of each other. This April's AnyLogic Conference, in addition to presentations from leading simulation practitioners, will feature an expert-led panel discussion on how agent-based simulation is helping AI develop beyond deep learning. The panel will be led by Anand Rao, Global Artificial Intelligence Lead and Partner at PwC. With 33 years industry experience and an AI background, he helps senior executives manage critical issues.

A year ago, Chinese President Xi Jinping stood before the 19th Communist Party Congress and laid out his ambitious plan for China to become a world leader by 2025 in advanced technologies such as robotics, biotechnology and artificial intelligence. It was seen as a direct challenge to U.S. leadership in advanced technology. James Lewis, a specialist in China and technology at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, says China recognizes that technological superiority helps give the United States an edge in national security and wants in on it. "The Chinese figured out that technology is the key to wealth and power, and the source of technology is still the West for China," says Lewis. The question is: "How do they get their hands on that Western technology?"

Today machine learning and artificial intelligence technologies are helping solve some of the biggest problems facing companies across the industrial spectrum. Boosting efficiency and production output in areas such as predictive maintenance and repair, defect detection and the optimization of supply chains, they are also starting to impact automated systems. In an increasingly digitized and hyper-connected world, almost every company generates and collects data. Ever more sophisticated machine learning (ML) algorithms can analyze this data to make predictions and refine processes. Combined with other advanced technologies such as the IoT, this is helping manufacturers gain a foothold in today's Industry 4.0 revolution.

One of the poorest kept secrets in Silicon Valley has been the huge salaries and bonuses that experts in artificial intelligence can command. Now, a little-noticed tax filing by a research lab called OpenAI has made some of those eye-popping figures public. OpenAI paid its top researcher, Ilya Sutskever, more than $1.9m (£1.35m) in 2016. It paid another leading researcher, Ian Goodfellow, more than $800,000 (£570,000) – even though he was not hired until March of that year. Both were recruited from Google.

If the U.S. is leading the way in artificial intelligence, China is playing catch-up and quickly emerging as an AI hotbed thanks to its talent, government support and venture capital funding. Chris Nicholson, a former Bloomberg news editor, co-founded artificial intelligence firm Skymind in San Francisco in 2014 and started expanding it outside the U.S. last year. Since Tencent is a big investor of his company, Nicholson assembled a team of four engineers in Fujian, a southeastern province in China, and plans to open another China office next year in Shenzhen, where Tencent is headquartered. "We saw lots of interest in AI in China, and the sector is moving so fast in the country," said Nicholson, CEO of Skymind. "Beijing supports AI, while Baidu, Alibaba and Tencent are all getting into AI. The U.S. still has the best AI talent, but there are many good engineers and AI researchers in China as well."

Chris Nicholson, 42, is chief executive of Skymind, an artificial intelligence company in San Francisco that's vying with dozens of other start-ups to emerge as a major player in the nascent AI economy. Google, Amazon, Apple, Facebook and other tech giants now dominate "deep learning" AI, powering such things as voice-activated personal assistants, image recognition and driverless cars. Skymind has built open-source programs and assembled a team of experts to help organizations smaller than Google or Apple build their own deep-learning programs. Thousands of start-up wannabees would love to have Skymind's funding -- $6.3 million from venture capitalist hotshots such as Ray Lane's GreatPoint Ventures and China's Tencent Holdings Ltd. "Montana is a beautiful place, with a lot of wonderful people," the Montana native said. "But if there's one adjective you'd use to describe it, it's remote. For anybody born curious in Montana, the first task is'how to expose myself to the world.'"