Tag: Google Cloud

Manila, Philippines – Local livestreaming platform Kumu and Google Cloud have announced a partnership in order to build AI tools to assist content creators in terms of entertainment, education, and customer service.

This collaboration between Kumu and Google Cloud aims to encourage more startups and enterprises alike to embrace the power of generative AI and to understand how this technology can best complement and strengthen their businesses. 

At a showcase event at the Google office in the Philippines, Rexy Dorado, co-founder and president at Kumu, showcased a live demo of “Crisostomo A.I. Barra”, Kumu’s first AI streamer who can respond to questions about Philippine history (even beyond what’s written in “Noli Me Tangere”, the novel that his character and personality was based on), the Kumu app, and general pop culture. Dorado also gave the attendees a sneak peek into other AI avatars in the pipeline: AI game show hosts, fortune tellers, tutors, tour guides, and customer support agents. 

An early adopter of Google Cloud’s generative AI capabilities for businesses, Kumu has been building its AI streamer and other AI avatars using Google Cloud’s PaLM 2 for Text and Chat first-party models, Embeddings for text and images, and Generative AI Studio – all of which can be accessed through the Vertex AI platform.

For the company, it has always sought ways to make Filipino content more fun and engaging with innovative technology. They added that as soon as generative AI started gaining traction, Kumu looked to an AI-first company like Google Cloud to explore how the technology could be applied to enhance its live content experiences.

Singapore – Sprinklr, a platform that manages customer experiences in modern companies, has recently made public the integration of its Sprinklr AI+ platform with Vertex AI on Google Cloud, enhancing its capabilities for unified customer experience management.

The Sprinklr AI+ platform provides generative AI capabilities for use across various business functions with strict governance and security standards. This integration enables users of Sprinklr to improve productivity and user experiences by fusing Vertex AI models with Sprinklr’s own AI.

With over 1,250 industry-specific AI models covering more than 100 languages and 150 countries, Sprinklr AI+ is the next phase in the development of Sprinklr’s AI. In order to provide customers with structured insights, it processes volumes of unstructured data, including text, audio, video, images, metrics, and time series data. 

Additionally, users of Sprinklr now have access to features across all four Sprinklr product suites: Sprinklr Service, Sprinklr Social, Sprinklr Marketing, and Sprinklr Insights, thanks to the integration of GoogleCloud’s Vertex AI APIs.

By implementing generative AI, retail companies can optimise their contact centre operations. This will allow service agents to modify response attributes like length, tone, and grammar with a single click. Additionally, this development gives agents access to personalised, real-time excerpts from chosen articles, streamlining customer interactions and developing service quality.

Speaking about the partnership, Ragy Thomas, CEO and founder of Sprinklr, remarked, “Generative AI is giving our AI wings. Our customers demand the ability to work with their preferred AI tools and partners and offering flexibility and choice is a major advantage. This expanded partnership with Google Cloud allows us to offer our customers access to their preferred generative AI platforms integrated with Sprinklr’s proprietary AI+ focused specifically on deriving insights from unstructured customer experience (CX) data.”

He added, “Together we can help the world’s most iconic brands leverage AI to break down silos and empower marketing, sales, and customer service professionals to serve customers the way they should in the new world.”

Meanwhile, Rodrigo Rocha, director of global partnerships at Google Cloud, said, “Generative AI can create entirely new experiences for users and value for businesses.Through our partnership, Vertex AI will power new generative AI experiences for Sprinklr users while ensuring the highest levels of data privacy and security.” 

Singapore – IPG Mediabrands has announced a partnership with Google Cloud to develop a suite of generative AI-powered applications that put brands at their center. Under the terms of the partnership, IPG Mediabrands will develop two pilot platforms, ‘Branvoice AI’ for branded content generation, and ‘BrandPortrait AI’ for audience and research insights.

The ‘BrandVoice AI’ pilot will use Google Cloud’s latest generative AI technology to codify the essence of brands so that written and image-based content can be ideated, briefed, and drafted in an automated, safe, and on-brand manner.

Meanwhile, the ‘BrandPortrait’ pilot will use the advanced conversational capabilities of Google’s large language models to provide IPG Mediabrands strategists and planners with the ability to generate and summarize proprietary research and audience data. 

All content will be approved by the brands – IPG Mediabrands clients – before being utilised by the AI pilot platforms. The first phase of the platform will completed by the third quarter this year.

The IPG Mediabrands Data & Technology Innovation department has been working exclusively on AI-based solutions for nearly four years, seeing AI as the ideal technology to augment the people and capabilities of IPG Mediabrands agencies. The innovation team has first experimented with generative AI technologies several years ago. Since then, it has built applications and prototypes that generate ad copy, imagery, reporting insights and SEO content, all proven out in real-world campaign scenarios.

IPG Mediabrands will now also use the power of Google Cloud’s generative AI support in Vertex AI, specifically the PaLM 2 language model, to take its solutions to the next level.

Eileen Kiernan, global CEO at IPG Mediabrands, said, “We are excited to partner with Google Cloud to develop this new platform. Not only does this partnership let us leverage market leading technology, but also we are aligned to Google’s responsible approach on data governance which ensures our clients information is well protected.”

She added, “We know that the potential of this technology is just scratching the surface, but we believe that by placing brands at the center of AI solutions, we get to a place where the true potential can be unlocked for brands and the industry overall.”

Meanwhile, Manvinder Singh, managing director of partnerships at Google Cloud, commented, “IPG Mediabrands will help to empower brands in new ways with their AI-based platform. The ability to quickly and effectively create content that is both engaging and aligned with brand values has the potential to help companies save money and more deeply connect with customers.”

Singapore – Google Cloud has announced the appointment of Mark Micallef as its new head of business for Southeast Asia. In his new role, Micallef will be in charge of establishing regional strategy, team building, and overall revenue performance, as well as working with teams throughout Google and supporting clients in transforming their businesses and industries.

With leadership roles held at Anaplan, Cloudera, Citrix, and Trend Micro, Mark Micallef brings a great deal of expertise to Google Cloud. Mark has led multiple organisations in Southeast Asia, Australia, New Zealand, Japan, Greater China, India, and Korea towards growth and scalability with his over 28 years of technical, sales, and managerial experience.

According to Karan Bajwa, vice president for Asia-Pacific at Google Cloud, Southeast Asia continues to be one of Google Cloud’s major and rapidly developing regions internationally. 

“We are excited to welcome a leader with a growth mindset and deep appreciation for the diverse needs across markets, as we continue to empower organisations to achieve transformative outcomes with best-in-class, AI-infrastructure, Mark joins us at a time when technology advancements are giving this region the opportunity to leapfrog into the AI economy, just as it became a digital and mobile-first economy that’s on track to be worth more than US$300 billion by 2025,” he said.

Speaking on his role, Micallef said, “With the current momentum surrounding AI, especially generative AI, business leaders want to know how they can make the most of this technology to transform their operations, disrupt industries, and realise new growth opportunities.” 

He added, “I’m thrilled to be joining a company that’s been at the forefront of this field for over two decades, and to be leading a highly talented team across Southeast Asia as we enable organisations of all sizes to innovate quickly, securely, and responsibly with enterprise-grade cloud AI models, platforms, and products suites.”

Recently, Google Cloud developed collaborations with the Singaporean government, including the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), the Smart Nation and Digital Government Office (SNDGO), and the Ministry of Communications and Information (MCI). These alliances seek to promote AI research in Singapore and encourage the globalisation of Singapore-developed AI solutions globally.

Malaysia – Google’s cloud computing services, Google Cloud, has announced the appointment of Patrick Wee as its country manager for Malaysia. The role will see him spearheading the local go-to-market operations for Google Cloud and Google Workspace. Now being at the helm of the business, Wee will be collaborating with teams across Google to help companies digitally transform their business with enterprise-grade solutions and cutting-edge technology.

Wee reports to Megawaty Khie, regional director of Google Cloud for Indonesia and Malaysia, who oversees Google Cloud’s enterprise, public sector, and corporate and mid-market business segments in both countries.

An industry veteran, Wee’s addition to the team follows recent leadership roles at Zoom and AWS, bringing extensive experience advising and working with C-level decision-makers across financial services, retail, consumer packaged goods, telecommunications, healthcare, high-tech, energy, and the public sector.

Khie said that Wee is joining them at such an exciting phase of growth in Malaysia, where they have been increasingly collaborating with organizations of all sizes—from large enterprises like Axiata Group and Media Prima to digital natives like Bungkusit. 

“We are so excited that a leader with such rich vision, experience, and industry network will be part of our growth journey in this important country,” added Khie.

Meanwhile, Wee himself commented, “I’m excited to be joining Google Cloud, which has been playing an important role in advancing Malaysian organizations’ digital transformation initiatives with the highest levels of security, scalability, and environmental sustainability offered by our open data cloud infrastructure and services,” 

He added, “I look forward to building on our success with local public sector agencies, enterprises, and startups, as we continue working together to foster a dynamic, highly skilled, and inclusive digital society, and accelerate the delivery of made-in-Malaysia products and digital applications to serve domestic and international markets.”

Just recently, Google Cloud has introduced new AI innovations for retail players and, alongside, announced its integration with Accenture. The new AI developments are said to aid retailers in their in-store shelf-checking processes and enhance their e-commerce sites. 

Meanwhile, the integration with Accenture is specifically with its ai.RETAIL platform as part of Google Cloud’s expanded strategic partnership.

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia – Google Cloud has announced new artificial intelligence (AI) innovations dedicated to retailers to aid in their in-store shelf checking processes and enhance their e-commerce sites with natural online shopping experiences for consumers. It has also integrated its technologies with Accenture’s ai.RETAIL platform as part of its expanded strategic partnership.

The first on the list is Google Cloud’s new AI-powered shelf checking solution that can help retailers improve on-shelf product availability, provide better visibility into what their shelves actually look like, and help them understand where restocks are needed. 

Built on Google Cloud’s Vertex AI Vision and powered by two machine learning (ML) models—a product recognizer and tag recognizer—the shelf checking AI enables retailers to identify products of all types, at scale, based solely on the visual and text features of a product, and then translate that data into actionable insights.

The company has also announced a new AI-powered browse feature in its Discovery AI solutions for retailers. This capability uses ML to optimise the order of products (i.e., which products the shopper sees first) on a retailer’s e-commerce site once shoppers choose a category, such as ‘women’s jackets’ or ‘kitchenware’.

Other Google Cloud announcements include more personalised search and browsing results with machine learning (ML), and the ‘Recommendations AI’ solution uses ML to help retailers bring product recommendations to their shoppers.

Meanwhile, Accenture’s ai.RETAIL is an integrated solution that helps retailers better utilise data and AI to optimise common systems and programs, such as customer acquisition, pricing and promotions, assortment, and supply chains. Retailers can now deploy the ai.RETAIL platform on Google Cloud, meaning it is extended to Google Cloud’s trusted infrastructure and is integrated with multiple Google Cloud products and capabilities.

For Megawaty Khie, country director for Indonesia and Malaysia at Google Cloud, the upheavals in the past few years have reshaped the retail landscape and retailers are now seeking new ways to be more efficient, more compelling to shoppers, and less exposed to future shocks.

“The leaders of tomorrow will be those who address today’s most pressing in-store and online challenges with the newest AI tools. Our work with Accenture will also help local retailers quickly adopt integrated solutions that amplify the true benefits of AI, so that they can holistically understand their business across functional boundaries and continuously optimise their offerings and operations to thrive in a complex retail environment,” Khie said.

Sridhar Subramanian, managing director of Accenture’s Google Business Group in Asia Pacific, commented that with shifting consumer buying habits, now more than ever, retailers need to invest in building a digital core – which includes a solid data foundation, ML, and AI. 

“With the best of Accenture’s integrated ai.RETAIL platform and Google Cloud technology, companies can now access products and capabilities to help improve consumer engagement and conversions, and make their supply chains more sustainable,” Subramanian said.

Google Cloud and Accenture are also collaborating on a broad, new initiative to address complex challenges facing retailers today, including applying intelligence from ai.RETAIL to help businesses optimise their customer, workforce, and storefront experiences, and utilising other technologies and offerings from both companies.

Singapore – Tech giant Google, through Google Cloud, has announced partnership with Singapore’s Smart Nation and Digital Government Group (SNDGG) to strengthen AI cooperation in Singapore, including co-creating solutions, deepen AI capabilities in public service, and shape AI governance and ethics.

Google’s parent company Alphabet and its other subsidiaries will work closely with SNDGG’s National AI Office and other government agencies to co-create, test-bed, and scale AI solutions in key sectors like finance, sustainability, and healthcare.

In addition, Google Cloud will provide dedicated training resources and certification programs to cultivate deep AI and machine learning proficiency for identified public sector officers. These programs reinforce Google Cloud’s commitment to bridging the AI talent gap, and will build on Google’s Skills Ignition SG training program in partnership with SkillsFuture Singapore (SSG) and Singapore’s Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA).

Lastly, Google Cloud will support the Singapore government’s efforts to shape AI governance and ethics in key sectors like finance. These efforts complement Google’s involvement in Singapore’s Advisory Council of the Ethical Use of AI.

Sherie Ng, country director for Singapore and Malaysia at Google Cloud, said, “Already recognized as a leading smart city, Singapore has continued to grow in stature as a global center of AI innovation and real-world application. It is a privilege to be the first technology company to enter into a partnership with SNDGG’s National AI Office to co-develop and deploy new AI solutions of value and relevance to Singaporeans and the future economy.” 

She added, “Through this public-private collaboration in the field of AI, we aim to advance the technology’s ability to deliver greater societal benefit in areas like financial inclusion, carbon footprint reduction, and personalised healthcare, while ensuring equity, privacy, transparency, and accountability.”

Meanwhile, Chng Zhenzhi, director of the National AI Office at SNDGG, commented, “This MOU is a win-win collaboration. Singapore will benefit from Google’s deep technical expertise and investments, while Google can tap on our rich innovation ecosystem. Singapore can also be a test-bed for Google’s efforts to trial new solutions safely, before introducing them to the region and beyond.” 

She added, “With the MOU, we can look forward to novel AI solutions that will make an impact on the way Singaporeans – and people around the world – live and work. This is one of the many examples of how the public service and private sector can come together to undertake innovative projects for the greater good.”

Taipei, Taiwan – Local digital marketing agency cacaFly and Google Cloud have partnered up to launch Cloud AI+ Solution Center in Taiwan. This will help enterprises accelerate their digital transformation by offering Google Cloud Platform services for AI applications, data analysis, and cloud technology. 

Since 2011, cacaFly has partnered with Google to offer digital advertising solutions for industries such as retail, e-commerce, finance, technology, games, and media. This partnership has been taken to another level in 2022 with the establishment of the new Cloud AI+ Solution Center, which will integrate data analytics, market-leading cloud technology, and Google Cloud Platform AI services and consulting.

The agency envisions this expansion into cloud services through the Google Cloud AI+ Solution Center will help give customers reduce costs, accelerate business decision-making, and anticipate market demands and unforeseen opportunities.

In addition, the partnership with Google Cloud will be the foundation of a marketing and enterprise ecosystem that incorporates marketing, data analytics, and cloud technology. In order to realise this vision, the company is actively recruiting related talents, including cloud architects, cloud engineers, cloud data consultants, and cloud project managers.

Nathan Chiu, CEO of cacaFly, said, “cacaFly has the utmost confidence to lead Taiwan’s talent and forge a complete marketing and enterprise ecosystem, which together with our partners, can go beyond Taiwan’s borders and be competitive on the global stage.”

Meanwhile, Tony Hsieh, country director for Google Cloud in Taiwan, commented, “Companies on their digital transformation journey need to strive for competitive advantages in digital marketing. The Google Cloud platform’s data analysis, AI, and machine learning solutions are necessary tools to help corporations realise their digital transformation, accelerate business decision-making and become more agile and adaptable.”

He added, “I am overjoyed cacaFly is partnering with Google Cloud in the establishment of the Cloud AI+ Solution Center. We are looking forward to providing cacaFly customers with complete solutions that will aid their 360-degree digital transformation.”

Thailand – Robinhood, a Bangkok-based food delivery and all-in-one travel service platform under SCBX Group, Purple Ventures Co., Ltd., has announced a multi-year strategic alliance with Google Cloud and MFEC Public Company Limited (MFEC) to advance its mission of building a homegrown super app that delivers inclusive growth opportunities to small business owners, delivery riders, and diverse users in metro and non-metro areas. Robinhood had already started planning late last year.

A super app is basically a unified app that has everything a person needs. This includes ride-hailing services, food delivery, payment wallets, flight and accommodation bookings, groceries, and many more. Currently, there are over a dozen super apps in Southeast Asia, each with its unique offering apart from integrating the other services that are offered in the app. In Thailand, super apps are available for consumers as well. However, there still isn’t a homegrown super app. The current super apps available in the country are from enterprises that have a strong business presence in the country.

April Srivikorn, country manager, Thailand at Google Cloud, pointed out that pandemic-driven shifts in consumer behaviour are expected to have a lasting impact, with food and transport, e-commerce, online travel, and digital financial services the key growth verticals in a resurgent internet economy that’s set to be worth US$57 billion by 2025.

Adopting a zero-commissions stance to give small businesses and riders a larger share of earnings, Robinhood was launched to alleviate the financial hardships faced by local food and beverage operators during the height of the pandemic and support the local tourism sector’s economic recovery. The three organizations will join forces to strengthen Robinhood’s culture of innovation, modernize its IT infrastructure, elevate user experiences using data-driven intelligence, and co-create new digital services.

According to Thana Thienachariya, chairman of the board at Purple Ventures, Robinhood’s differentiated business model enables them to generate revenue from other independent services, such as providing loans to individuals in their ecosystem, instead of charging smaller restaurants and hoteliers platform fees that erode their earning.

Thienachariya added, “With a fleet of 30,000 riders supporting 225,000 eateries, and 16,000 hotels already listed on our platform, Robinhood has become the food and travel application of choice for 2.8 million users. Together with Google Cloud and MFEC, we hope to build on the very warm response to our platform in the past 20 months and supercharge our expansion into the tour, car rental, flight bookings, and grocery and express parcel delivery services. This super app vision is an extension of our steadfast commitment toward assisting smaller players and revitalizing the grassroots economy.”

On the partnership with Google, Srihanath Lamsam, CEO of Purple Ventures, shared, that this was due to Google’s superior data cloud infrastructure which runs with net-zero operational emissions, and its rich experience in mapping the world and building open platforms and ecosystems. These capabilities, along with MFEC’s technical consulting and implementation expertise, will amplify Robinhood’s ability to create value for society, while contributing to our sustainability commitments.

The strategic alliance will encompass five core pillars including: 

  • Cultivating skilled talent and a culture of innovation – the three companies will establish a Cloud Center of Excellence (CCoE) consisting of cloud architecture, data management, and application modernization specialists.
  • Enhancing the quality of digital services – the CCoE will tap microservices and extended Google Play Store support to ensure Robinhood’s customer and rider applications remain robust, reliable, and lightweight – even as new services are added and accessed by a high volume of users.
  • Serving hyper-personalized user engagement – the CCoE will build and manage an intelligent data engine using Google Cloud’s leading analytics, AI, and ML technologies. The data engine will also engage Robinhood users with hyper-personalized product recommendations on behalf of small businesses, to boost these merchants’ revenue streams.
  • Increasing income opportunities for riders – Robinhood will explore using Google Maps Platform’s software development kits to fast-track the creation and integration of on-demand mobility features. Potential use cases include providing riders with in-app, turn-by-turn navigation after identifying the shortest or fastest routes, so they can ride safer, fulfil orders quicker, and earn more.
  • Making financial assistance easily accessible – Robinhood will explore co-innovation initiatives with Google Cloud to embed virtual banking and microlending services into its application. This would allow small business owners to seamlessly apply for financial assistance to purchase new equipment and hire staff, or for prospective delivery riders to rent electric motorcycles.

Meanwhile, Siriwat Vongjarukorn, CEO and President, MFEC, commented, “With our newly formed CCoE imparting critical cloud skills, adopting an open cloud architecture, implementing data governance best practices, and automating application deployment, Robinhood can achieve performance at scale, optimize IT costs, uphold the highest data security and privacy standards, and empower its developers to release continuous software updates – without downtime – to enrich its entire digital ecosystem.” 

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia – Google Cloud and AwanBiru Technology Berhad (Awantec), a technology and talent management company have signed a new Cloud Framework Agreement (CFA) in an official ceremony hosted by the Malaysian Administrative Modernisation and Management Planning Unit (MAMPU) and the Prime Minister of Malaysia, Ismail Sabri, to accelerate public sector innovation and the delivery of digital citizen-centric services.

The CFA reinforces Google Cloud’s commitment to supporting the Malaysian Government’s MyDIGITAL blueprint which aims to bridge the digital divide and grow the country’s digital economy. Terms of the agreement will also see Malaysia’s public sector gain access to Google Cloud’s cloud infrastructure, data warehouse, data security, artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning (ML) and application modernisation capabilities, in addition to privacy and compliance controls, Carbon Sense Suite and other cloud-native tools.

Such services can be accessed in any of Google Cloud’s 88 availability zones in 29 geographic regions across the world, as well as its 146 network edge locations.

Sherie Ng, country director of Singapore and Malaysia at Google Cloud, said that more than 8 in 10 online consumers in Malaysia are now using digital services, due to a permanent shift that’s been brought about by the pandemic. 

“MAMPU, through its strategic and forward-looking cloud-first policy, is marshaling the advanced cloud technology infrastructure, tools, applications and talent to significantly accelerate the development of next-generation citizen-centric services – to meet the expectations of the rakyat for digitalised public sector interactions and experiences matching that of the digital native businesses they frequently interact with,” Ng said.

“Having signed this CFA with the Malaysian Government, we look forward to playing an active role in bringing the next phase of its MyDIGITAL blueprint to life. By offering government agencies easier access to flexible, scalable, secure and sustainable cloud infrastructure and services, we aim to help them realize new possibilities in public service delivery to serve the rakyat – be it in education, healthcare, transport, or financial inclusion, etc. – and contribute to the vision of establishing Malaysia as a regional digital economic powerhouse by 2030,” Ng added.

As per the agreement, managed service provider (MSP) Awantec will offer technology consulting and digital skilling programs to public sector agencies, such as conducting user research, supporting rapid prototyping using Google Cloud tools, and driving best practices for cloud implementations at scale.

On the company’s partnership with Google Cloud, Rezal Rahman, CEO of Awantec, commented, “Being a technology and talent digitalization enabler in Malaysia, Awantec is proud to be Google Cloud’s local partner and are jointly committed to empowering Malaysia’s public sector to innovate and deliver critical new citizen-centric services at scale, as Google Cloud is an established leader in enabling organizations of all sizes to securely and transparently convert massive datasets into intelligence and insights.

“With two decades of experience delivering technology solutions and skilling programs to the Government, our joint business relationship is also positively reflected in recent project wins, Rahman added. 

Prior to the CFA, Google Cloud and Awantec entered into an agreement with Malaysia’s Ministry of Education in July 2021 to provide Google Workspace to public schools, seeking to boost staff productivity and elevate students’ learning experience while keeping their work, identities, and privacy safe through security controls.

In addition, Google Cloud has been gaining mindshare and market share with large enterprises across various sectors in Malaysia, especially those operating in regulated industries.