Microsoft to replicate AP model in other states 

The software giant has helped AP govt build solutions for education, agriculture, eCitizen services
We believe that the power of our technologies can clearly help the governments. We are constantly working with the central government here. If any government is looking at actually solving the problems in education, agriculture, health etc, the technology platform is available - Anil Bhansali, MD, Microsoft India (R&D)

Hyderabad: Buoyed by the successful execution of the memorandum of understanding (MoU) signed with the Andhra Pradesh Government, software behemoth Microsoft is contemplating replicating the same in other states in India.

“We believe that the power of our technologies can clearly help the governments. We are constantly working with the government (Centre) here. If any government is looking at actually solving the problems (education, agriculture, health etc) … the technology is stalk and the platform is available,” Anil Bhansali, Managing Director of Microsoft India (R&D), told reporters on Wednesday.

The Andhra Pradesh Government had, in December 2015, signed an MoU with Microsoft to build three proof-of-concept solutions by applying the latter’s Azure machine learning and advanced visualisation method in the fields of education, agriculture and eCitizen services.

At present, the Andhra Pradesh Government is using machine learning to analyse and predict drop outs and take preventive actions. “When we started the pilot, we started with Grade 10. As we get more data plugged into the model, more Grades will be added,” Bhansali said.

Stating that Microsoft’s goal and strategy is to build best-in-class platforms and productivity services for a mobile-first and Cloud-first world, Bhansali said Bing and Cortana Intelligence Suite were a very key part of the strategy.

Built on Microsoft Azure and powered by research into big data, machine learning, perception, analytics and intelligent bots, Cortana’s capabilities can be used by developers and businesses to create intelligent end-to-end solutions, including new apps that learn about our world and bots and agents that interact with people in personalised, intelligent ways.

Microsoft demonstrated Seeing AI, a research project that uses computer vision and natural language processing to describe a person’s surroundings, read text, answer questions and even identify emotions on people’s faces, at the company’s Build conference in March 2016.

Seeing AI, which can be used as a cell phone app or via smart glasses from Pivothead, does not currently have a release date. “Seeing AI is not launched commercially as yet. We believe that it has a big potential for impact and make lives of the blind better,” Bhansali said.