Idein Co., Ltd., which provides the edge AI platform “Actcast”, held a media roundtable on April 14, 2022, and explained the business development of “Actcast”. Also on this day, Aisin, with whom we have a business tie-up, took the stage and introduced the multimodal agent “Saya”, which is being developed in collaboration with Idein.
Mr. Susumu Osuga of Aisin (left) and Mr. Koichi Nakamura of Idein (right)
Idein Co., Ltd.’s mission is to “make it possible to handle all kinds of information with software”. It’s a hot start-up company.
Table of Contents
- “Actcast” finds a way out in the compiler
- Partnership with Aisin Deepens Relationship
- Automated valet parking system provides cloud and AI technology
- Development of a multimodal agent “Saya” that everyone can relate to
“Actcast” finds a way out in the compiler
“Actcast” is Japan’s largest edge AI platform that collects and utilizes real-world data using image and audio analysis technology.
Besides advanced AI analysis, Actcast’s best feature is its price. AI models, which normally run on devices costing several hundred thousand yen, can be run at a low price of several thousand yen per unit without weight reduction using Idein’s unique technology.
By using Raspberry Pi, a single board computer with low processing power, which had not been used as edge AI hardware until now, we succeeded in significantly reducing costs. In general, it was not used for edge AI because the processing power of the CPU installed in the Raspberry Pi was not sufficient, but we found a way out in the compiler and developed it independently, using the built-in GPU. By optimizing to maximize cache memory efficiency, image analysis AI can now perform high-speed processing.
In addition, Actcast has rapidly increased the number of registrations since the beginning of 2022, and the number of registrations exceeded 15,000 in April. In the last three months, the number of registrations has increased by about five times, and it is expected to increase further in the future.
Partnership with Aisin Deepens Relationship
In 2017, when Aisin was in charge of the “driver monitor system” that supports the automated driving system for Toyota’s “Advanced Drive”, Idein and Aisin developed facial/facial feature points, wearer determination, and line of sight. It all started when I asked Idein for cooperation in AI development such as detection.
Susumu Osuka , chief engineer of Aisin’s Advanced Development Department , said, “We had already decided on the hardware and Arm core processors to use, and we asked Idein for help, and we were able to get results in a short period of three to four months. I received it and was surprised at its speed.”
Due to such circumstances, we have formed a capital tie-up since 2018, and currently we are strengthening cooperation, such as several employees from Aisin working at Idein in the form of training in order to know the atmosphere of a startup company.
Automated valet parking system provides cloud and AI technology
At the press conference, an “automatic valet parking system” was introduced as a project that the company is currently working on.
An automated valet parking system is a combined parking lot and car system in which the car drives automatically and parks in an empty parking space.
When the driver gets out of the car at the automated valet parking lot and asks the AI agent to accept the parking, the car automatically drives and vacates while checking the surrounding safety with the in-vehicle AI camera and the infrastructure camera in the parking lot. park in a space
Idein’s Actcast-linked edge AI camera is used for this infrastructure camera, and the recognition result of the information and the information of the in-vehicle AI camera is integrated in the cloud. In addition, the infrastructure camera uses AI to create the maps necessary for automatic driving and to estimate the self-position.
Development of a multimodal agent “Saya” that everyone can relate to
The multimodal agent “Saya” is a full CG high school character created by the CG production unit TELYUKA, which is expected to be used at the reception of the automatic valet parking system and the self-driving bus.
Saya uses Idein’s image recognition AI technology, enabling facial recognition, age/gender estimation, emotion and gesture recognition. It remembers your face and name and talks to you, checks if you are holding on to the handrail or if you have forgotten something, and calls out to you, realizing more human-like customer service.
In addition, speech recognition, speech synthesis, and lip-syncing according to the content of the conversation make it possible to have more natural conversations.
However, in order to run Saya, a number of advanced processes are performed, so two high-performance PCs equipped with Intel’s “Core i9” and NVIDIA’s “RTX 3090” are used. And there was a problem that the system had to be miniaturized. Therefore, in cooperation with Idein, we are aiming to consolidate into one low-priced “Jetson AGX” by June 2022. As a result, Saya’s playing field is expected to expand.
