Cover Jau Hsiung Huang, founder and CEO, CyberLink
Jau Hsiung Huang, founder and CEO, CyberLink
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Asia’s tech innovators are leading the development of AI in transportation, beauty, education and more industries
Autonomous vehicles, intelligent virtual assistants, personalised medicine—these are but a few ways artificial intelligence (AI) is revolutionising the human experience. At the forefront of these changes are the tech innovators of Asia’s Most Influential who are pioneering its application in many industries. Through their tech companies and venture firms, they push the boundaries of AI’s capabilities, shaping its next iterations and driving breakthroughs in machine learning, natural language processing, computer vision, robotics and more. Just as critical is their role in safeguarding its use: amidst AI’s wide-scale effects on humanity, these founders and CEOs are also considering responsible practices and ethical principles to help the world reap AI’s rewards while mitigating its potential risks.
Also read: Meet Asia’s tech disruptors who are creating the blueprint for tomorrow
Ayesha Khanna, co-founder and CEO, Addo AI (Singapore)
Above Ayesha Khanna, co-founder and CEO, Addo AI
Ayesha Khanna, co-founder and CEO, Addo AI
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Ayesha Khanna’s Addo AI taps into the power of machine learning, data engineering and data governance to build data platforms that optimise the operations of corporations and governments. The AI firm, for example, created a data analytics platform that allowed a telecom operator to gain real-time insights for decision-making, as well as an AI-powered chatbot that offered personalised travel experiences.
As she pushes the frontiers of AI, Khanna emphasises the important role that humans play in its development. “Technology will never replace humans, as there will always be a need for people to be involved in technology to maximise its potential,” said Khanna in an essay for Tatler. “AI, for one thing, is fundamentally dependent on good-quality data, and will need people who understand data or can create a ‘golden source of truth’ (a single source of truth from which data is constructed), which is critical to good data governance.”
Read Ayesha Khanna’s full profile on Asia’s Most Influential
Alice Chang, founder and CEO, Perfect Corp (Taiwan)
Above Alice Chang, founder and CEO, Perfect Corp
Alice Chang, founder and CEO, Perfect Corp
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“If you don’t innovate, you will just wait... every beauty brand is now aware of the urgency of digitalisation, and when it comes to digitalisation, innovation is a very basic element. I like to create something new,” said Alice Chang to Tatler. After founding Perfect Corp in 2015, the tech entrepreneur transformed the start-up into the world’s leader in AI- and AR-powered skin, make-up and face technologies.
In May 2024 the company, whose services have been adopted by global brands such as MAC, Clinique, Meta and Snapchat, unveiled six AI-powered beauty technologies at the Viva Technology conference in Paris. These innovations include BeautyGPT, which facilitates virtual make-up try-ons and interactive make-up tutorials, SkincareGPT, which can detect skin issues using a camera, and AI Makeup Transfer, which can extract a make-up look from an image and then transfer it to the photo of user’s face, matching the look’s colours with real-world cosmetics.
Jau Hsiung Huang, founder and CEO, CyberLink (Taiwan)
Above Jau Hsiung Huang, founder and CEO, CyberLink
Jau Hsiung Huang, founder and CEO, CyberLink
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At CyberLink, tech innovator Jau Hsiung Huang has channelled artificial intelligence into the development of FaceMe. Powered by deep learning algorithms, the AI facial recognition engine has been adopted in retail, security, surveillance and smart home uses, as well as in banking, where its anti-spoofing technologies apply liveliness detection to protect against biometric fraud. FaceMe can also be used to verify identities and then recognise a person as either a VIP or a block-listed individual. Apart from facial recognition, CyberLink develops creative editing software that now includes AI technologies.
In June 2024 the company introduced AI Magic Designer and AI CoWriter, new generative AI features in its design software, Promeo. Both are engineered to quickly generate marketing content (social media posts, ads, flyers), including images, text and templates based on simple text prompts.
Read Jau Hsiung Huang’s full profile on Asia’s Most Influential
Kai Fu Lee, founder, Sinovation Ventures (Taiwan)
Above Kai Fu Lee, founder, Sinovation Ventures
Kai Fu Lee, founder, Sinovation Ventures
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In his non-fiction book AI Superpowers, artificial intelligence expert Kai Fu Lee peers into a near future where the duopoly of the US and China leads the charge in AI innovation. The former president of Google China, who has written two books on the subject, also outlines the impact of AI on jobs and how people and governments can navigate the dramatic changes. Apart from being one of AI’s greatest thinkers, Lee is also the founder of Sinovation Ventures, which invests in AI, deep tech, robotics, new energy and more. In 2023, the CEO launched 01.AI, a dedicated start-up that develops platforms and applications for the next phase of artificial intelligence. With a vision to make artificial general intelligence beneficial for people, the start-up has already achieved unicorn status, reaching over US$1 billion valuation a few months after its launch. 01.AI has released its open-source large language model Yi series.
Mark Koh, CEO and co-founder, Supa (Malaysia)
Above Mark Koh, CEO and co-founder, Supa
Mark Koh, CEO and co-founder, Supa
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Mark Koh’s Supa helps build the infrastructure that supports AI development. Powered by generative AI, the company labels raw data, making it understandable for machine learning algorithms. For online shopping giant Carousell, for example, it delivered more accurate training data, which was used to improve search and recommendation functions for a personalised shopping experience. Its solutions also include generating captions for images and sketches based on prompts, classifying the contents of an image, and the AI assistant Mila, which can solve customer queries accurately through conversational replies. Supa has labelled over 100 million data points for unicorns, enterprises and start-ups worldwide, helping them build AI products in healthcare, consumer retail, transport, robotics, agriculture and more industries.
Tang Xiao’ou, co-founder, SenseTime (Hong Kong)
Tang Xiao’ou, who was a professor of information engineering at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, founded AI firm SenseTime in 2014. Since then, the company has been shaping an AI-powered future, introducing breakthroughs in decision intelligence, autonomous driving, computer vision and more.
In 2023 it introduced SenseNova, its AGI-geared foundation model that has capabilities in natural language processing, content generation and custom model training. It also unveiled several AI-generated content applications, including SenseChat, its large-scale language model that may rival the popular platform ChatGPT. In December 2023, the company announced the passing of Tang Xiao’ou. The billionaire computer scientist died at the age of 55.
Tatler Asia’s Most Influential is the definitive list of people shaping our world today. Asia's Most Influential brings together the region's most innovative changemakers, industry titans and thought leaders who are driving positive impact in Asia and beyond. View the full list here.
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