Google snaps its largest European acquisition, focuses on AI

Google has made its largest European acquisition yet with the purchase of DeepMind, an artificial intelligence start-up based in London. Technology news website Re/code, which reported news of the deal earlier, said the price was $400 million, without disclosing the source of the information.

DeepMind was operating in a secretive “stealth mode” before it had launched its first products when Google swooped to snap up its team and sophisticated “machine learning” technology, through which computers can teach themselves new capabilities without human input.

Google, which is working on projects including self-driving cars and robots, has become increasingly focused on artificial intelligence in recent years.

In 2012, it hired Ray Kurzweil, considered one of the leading minds in the field, and in May it announced a partnership with NASA and several universities to launch the Quantum Artificial Intelligence Lab.

Though DeepMind may not be a popular name in tech, sources in the artificial intelligence community said the company was a formidable AI player and it has been aggressively recruiting. One source said DeepMind has a team of at least 50 people and has secured more than $50 million in funding. This person described DeepMind as “the last large independent company with a strong focus on artificial intelligence,” and said it competed with companies like Google, Facebook and Baidu for talent.

However, little is known about the group, which despite its prominent investors and aggressive hiring spree had kept a low profile in London’s sociable start-up scene. Larry Wasserman, a professor in the machine learning department at Carnegie Mellon University, wrote in a blogpost in 2012 after meeting the company that it was “trying to build a system that thinks”, by combining machine learning and neuroscience.

“I thought it sounded crazy until [co-founder Shane Legg] told me the list of famous billionaires who have invested in the company,” Prof Wasserman wrote.

Speculations have appeared that given enough computing power, the technology could create a “world of super-intelligent computers surpassing humans”.

The deal is the latest in a growing number of Google acquisitions in futuristic technologies, including robotics pioneer Boston Dynamics, maker of realistic animal and humanoid machines.
Earlier this month, Google paid $3.2bn to buy Nest Labs, which makes “smart home” devices, its largest-ever purchase of a private company.

The 42 analysts polled by CNN Money and offering 12-month price forecasts for Google Inc have a median target of 1,200.00, with a high estimate of 1,350.00 and a low estimate of 880.00. The median estimate represents a 6.78% increase from the last price of 1,123.83. The current consensus among polled investment analysts is to buy stock in Google Inc.