IBM and the UK Military
October 31, 2019
After trying its hand at everything from recipes to healthcare, Watson branched out into the military a few years ago. Now, IBM is using its AI tech to help out an old ally. NS Tech reports, “Revealed: IBM’s £4m Deal to Build Prototype AI Software Platform for UK Military.” Writer and NS Tech editor Oscar Williams cites a contract notice from the Ministry of Defense (MoD), which considers the forthcoming platform a way to gain an operational advantage. We’re told IBM won the £3.8m (or about $4.9m) contract in September, and has a year to demonstrate its worth. Williams writes:
“The contract notice, identified through Tussell’s procurement database, states that the proof of concept will be cloud-hosted and reliant on a large computer processor to analyze existing commercial data sources. The data sources could include mapping data from Ordinance Survey and weather data from the Met Office, as well as flight paths and navigation channels, said [former MoD IT director Gerry] Cantwell. The deal was struck around six months after the US government awarded an $800m battlefield software contract to Palantir, a big data analytics firm founded by the Paypal billionaire and Trump supporter Peter Thiel. NS Tech revealed in August that Palantir has won nearly £11m [about $14m] of MoD contracts over the last four years. An MOD spokesperson said: ‘We have awarded a contract to IBM to assist with the development of a standalone AI proof of concept, using commercially available data.’”
Not surprisingly, the MOD spokesperson refused to explain the similarities or differences between their upcoming platform to the US battlefield platform. IBM likewise declined to comment.
Cynthia Murrell, October 31, 2019
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