Paris is gaining ground as a European hub for artificial intelligence research as Alphabet Inc’s Google and Facebook Inc pledge to hire staff and invest in labs, after their top executives met with French President Emmanuel Macron.
Google said it will create an AI lab dedicated to fundamental research on themes like automatic learning, language and a computer’s ability to see, with the aim of applying findings to fields from health to the environment. The end-goal is to grow this group to a size similar to Google’s existing team of 120 engineers who do applied research in Paris, working on developments for Chrome and YouTube, a company spokeswoman said.