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Microsoft’s synthetic intelligence head Mustafa Suleyman is constructing a brand new staff centered on client well being by hiring workers from an identical unit he as soon as led at Google DeepMind, because the rival corporations race to create profitable functions from the cutting-edge expertise.
Suleyman, a British entrepreneur who co-founded DeepMind in 2010, has employed Dominic King, the previous head of DeepMind’s well being unit and a UK-trained surgeon, as vice-president of Microsoft AI’s new London-based well being staff.
He has additionally poached Christopher Kelly, a scientific analysis scientist at DeepMind and a neonatal intensive care physician at Evelina Youngsters’s Hospital in London, in addition to two others from his time on the AI start-up.
Microsoft’s new client AI well being division comes as tech teams rush to show generative AI right into a staple of on a regular basis life, in a bid to drive revenues from the fast-developing expertise. Sir Demis Hassabis, co-founder and chief government of DeepMind, can also be centered on healthcare, similar to main spin-off AI group Isomorphic Labs, which is engaged on drug discovery.
Well being has turn into one of many progress areas within the AI growth. Shoppers have usually turned to the online for health-related queries, and a Deloitte survey this yr discovered that 48 per cent of respondents requested generative AI chatbots similar to ChatGPT, Gemini, Copilot or Claude health-focused questions.
These embody questions on particular well being circumstances, signs and psychological well being. Microsoft AI’s well being unit will concentrate on most of these client well being functions utilizing generative AI.
The US tech group, which employed Suleyman earlier this year, confirmed the creation of its new unit. “In our mission to tell, assist and empower everybody with accountable AI, well being is a crucial use case,” mentioned Microsoft. “We proceed to rent prime expertise in assist of those efforts.”
Google DeepMind’s well being operation, based by Suleyman, began in 2016 and grew to a staff of greater than 100 individuals primarily based in London. The unit had signed a five-year partnership with 10 UK NHS hospitals to course of the medical knowledge of 1.6mn sufferers, and launched an app to watch sufferers’ important indicators.
Nonetheless, DeepMind was later embroiled in controversy over its work for the UK well being sector amid considerations in regards to the safety of affected person knowledge. This led to Suleyman’s unit being spun off in 2019 by father or mother firm Alphabet right into a Google unit in California headed by David Feinberg, the previous chief government of Geisinger, one of many US’s largest personal well being teams.
Suleyman left DeepMind that very same yr, taking over a brand new coverage function at Google’s California headquarters earlier than leaving in 2022 to do a stint as a enterprise investor. He later created AI start-up Inflection.
In March, Microsoft employed Suleyman from Inflection in addition to most of its workers, together with Karén Simonyan, co-founder and chief scientist of Inflection, and a former DeepMind researcher himself.
Different latest hires for Microsoft’s AI well being unit embody Peter Hames, the previous chief government of UK digital well being start-up Large Well being and Bay Gross, co-founder of digital healthcare supplier Cityblock Well being.
As a part of his broader staff, Suleyman has additionally employed former DeepMind colleagues Nando de Freitas and Trevor Again, who led the start-up’s well being analysis staff. Nonetheless, each de Freitas and Again is not going to work particularly on Microsoft’s well being functions.
