The Enlightenment of the Development of Artificial Intelligence in Dubai

Governments around the world are beginning to recognize the potential and importance of artificial intelligence. With the implementation of artificial intelligence regulations, the acceptance of the international community is also expanding. Hitec Dubai, one of the world's largest hotel technology fairs, will also arrive on December 5th and 6th this year. The fair brings together a large number of financial and technical staff to provide solutions and cutting-edge technology for the more than $75 billion market in the Middle East. Most notably, according to organizers, Dubai has attracted $21.66 billion in foreign investment in the artificial intelligence and robotics markets in three years. In this case, Dubai has also become the most popular technology transfer city in 2018.

At the same time, thanks to the vision of the leaders, the local government of Dubai has become a “excellent laboratory” for providing public services to citizens. After all, few cities can conduct artificial intelligence experiments on service delivery like Dubai. Currently, the UAE has invested heavily in technology to improve the delivery of government services. In October last year, the country also appointed a “Artificial Intelligence Minister” to represent the UAE in the new phase of future skills, future science and future technologies. However, although the government is supporting pilots based on artificial intelligence technology and implementing it throughout the UAE, it turns out that Dubai is the main city that is good at discovering and using artificial intelligence opportunities.

As part of its rapid economic development, Dubai has created an environment that attracts start-ups and investment capital and involves a wide range of technological developments. But perhaps the most ambitious aspect of this work is Dubai's acceptance of artificial intelligence technology, because the UAE has positioned itself as the global center of the so-called "fourth industrial revolution." In addition to tax credits to attract businesses, Dubai and the UAE are also directly investing in a number of existing and start-ups. At the same time, the country is also investing heavily in its own artificial intelligence laboratory in the delivery of its public services.

In general, from education, transportation to other government services, artificial intelligence will change the way Dubai manages and governs cities.

First, use artificial intelligence to meet educational needs

The UAE plans to use artificial intelligence to meet the educational needs of the region, which has become an increasingly urgent public policy issue that needs to be addressed. A recent survey of the UAE and the entire region shows that there will be a shortage of teachers in the region in the next four years. To solve this shortage, artificial intelligence teaching assistants (including teaching robots) will join many schools in Dubai. On the one hand, this method can help students to coach on personalized courses, not let the children fall behind, and at the same time not let the outstanding students wait for other students to catch up with the progress. On the other hand, robot assistants can synchronize with the school's records, creating personal information for each student to facilitate teaching in accordance with their aptitude.

Combined with predictive analytics tools and artificial intelligence platforms, robots will “know” the academic strengths and weaknesses of students and anticipate the need to tailor their work to the student. At this stage, robot teachers are just a tool, and they have no plans to cancel human teachers. With the help of AI teaching assistants, human teachers can have more students in a class while still ensuring that everyone gets enough and targeted attention. In this regard, supporters believe that Dubai students will be more capable and competitive in the future technology-driven workforce.

Second, use artificial intelligence to ease traffic congestion

In addition to education, Dubai’s leaders also plan to use artificial intelligence to alleviate traffic congestion. Long commuting and traffic congestion are not a new challenge, but the public’s purchase of cars and the rapid increase in the number of cars on the streets have seriously exacerbated Dubai’s traffic problems. As a result, Dubai began to actively focus on the future of smart travel layout.

In this regard, Dubai Chief Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum has set a goal that by 2030, about 25% of the trips will be self-driving cars. This strategic move will not reduce the number of cars on the road, but it may reduce vehicle accidents. Data projections show that Dubai's steering to autonomous driving is expected to reduce transportation costs by 44%, reduce annual expenditures of $6 billion due to traffic accidents, and reduce traffic accidents and pollution by 12% annually.

Dubai is also actively seeking advice from the world's autonomous driving research and development centers, and is interested in making Dubai the world's largest "automated research and development laboratory", and even the Dubai Future Foundation has created a driverless one. The video of the experience depicts a blueprint for future autonomous driving.

In March of this year, there were media reports that Dubai had begun testing the world's first self-driving taxi (automatic pod), hoping to help transform the city into one of the smartest cities in the world. It is reported that the Dubai Highway Transportation Authority has displayed two square vehicles made in Italy by Next Future Transportation in the United States. It can carry up to 10 passengers at a time, and can be split according to the destination and passengers. At the same time, RTA officials said several projects, including autonomous buses and marine transportation systems, are under development.

At the same time, traditional modes of transportation are being transformed to compete with the technology being implemented in Dubai. It is worth noting that its bus will soon be equipped with facial recognition technology to assess the ability of bus drivers to perform basic job functions. Specifically, the facial recognition camera can determine if the bus driver is tired, whether he is focused or looking at the phone. Early results showed that the use of the new system reduced the fatigue driving rate by 88%. In addition, the technology can actively advise drivers to help them stay alert during driving, thereby increasing community efficiency and safety.

Third, AI becomes an effective intermediary between the public and government services

Artificial intelligence systems have quickly become an effective intermediary between citizens and government services. Dubai may soon integrate these systems into basic services that interact with citizens. That is to say, in addition to education and transportation, Dubai is still using artificial intelligence technology to provide citizens with a range of other public services.

For example, the Dubai Water and Electricity Authority (DEWA) implemented the “Rammas” chat bot through the Google AI platform at its Customer Happiness Centers in January 2017. It is reported that the implementation of this service is to understand and answer written questions in Arabic and English. What makes Rammas unique is that it can learn and adjust to the questions people ask. The goal of the service is to increase access to knowledge and information to customers, which is part of Dubai's smart city goals. In less than a year after the launch of Ramma, as of the end of January 2018, the system had replied with approximately 700,000 queries, reducing the number of visits by the physical department by 80%.

In September of this year, DEWA also collaborated with experts at the University of California at Berkeley to organize artificial intelligence leadership. Among them, DEWA leaders and staff specializing in artificial intelligence research will participate in the project. In this program, the latest developments in energy, water, machine learning, data science and applications, and other related topics of artificial intelligence technology are covered. In addition, participants have a deeper understanding of artificial intelligence applications in the work environment. Virtual implementation. It can be said that this plan is an effort to support the Dubai Hydropower Authority to keep up with the pace of the fourth industrial revolution.

Fourth, artificial intelligence detection technology appears in customs, airports

In order to ensure synchronization with the latest technology in the world, this month, Dubai Customs launched a new and advanced intelligent detection device using 3D CT scanning. The advanced technology used in this new equipment will be a turning point in the inspection field and will greatly alleviate the heavy daily work of Dubai Customs inspectors.

It is understood that Dubai Customs uses 944 inspection systems: 6 container scanning systems, 24 small cargo scanning systems, 23 drug and explosives detectors, 4 large cargo scanning systems and 700 radioactive detectors, and 187 communication device. These smart devices effectively support Dubai's vision of becoming the world's leading customs management for legal trade and their mission to protect society and sustain economic development through regulations, amenities and innovative initiatives. Most importantly, the new system will greatly improve inspection performance and enable inspectors to do their jobs more efficiently.

Prior to this, the airport in Dubai has launched facial recognition detection technology in artificial intelligence technology to replace the ordinary passport inspection process. In this regard, Talal Ahmad Al Shanqeti, assistant director of the airport passport department, said that the open use of smart identification doors greatly facilitates the travel experience of travellers, they will not need to verify fingerprints, and do not need a separate passport check. When a passenger arrives or leaves the airport, the passport manager synchronizes the biometric data with the passport, so the passport is already registered when the passenger arrives at Dubai Airport next time.

All in all, Dubai is becoming a model of smart city and artificial intelligence experiments supported by the government. At the same time, the city will also cooperate with industry-leading companies and investors from a range of startups in the process of achieving intelligence. . The UAE and Dubai will soon identify and support the technologies developed by these groups in the AI ??field. They are looking for useful tools to adapt them to government service needs in innovative ways and to provide lessons for other cities around the world.