How Artificial Vision can Improve Billions of Lives | ZIv Aviram | TEDxSaoPauloSalon

Sometimes big things happen by chance, the result of circumstances, and their impact is realized only in retrospect. This is what happened to us when we founded our first company, Mobileye. So in 1998, my partner, Professor Joshua, gave a lecture at Toyota. My partner is one of the leading scientists in the world in computer vision. During the lecture, one of the engineers asked him, 'Tell me, Professor, is it possible to detect vehicles based on two cameras?' And he intuitively said, 'Yes, but with two cameras, a driver can...' which is car accidents. After this lecture, we indeed founded Mobileye. It was 20 years ago, and today Mobileye is the leading supplier in the field called ADAS, advanced driver assistance systems, and we are pioneering today the autonomous driving. So with Mobileye technology, we have the potential to save many millions of lives and to prevent hundreds of millions of injuries, and all that based on artificial intelligence. And with our second company, OrCam, which we founded eight years ago, we believe that artificial intelligence can empower our lives and benefit humanity on a big scale.

Let me stop. This is Mobileye. Imagine a small camera situated behind the rearview mirror, looking forward and constantly analyzing the scene in front of you like a third eye. When I say analyzing the scene, it means that we can understand and detect vehicles in front of us, pedestrians, traffic signs, traffic lights, lane marks. The green carpet that you see is a free space in front of the vehicle. More than 95% of the automakers adapted sensors like radar, lidar, and other sensors. So our life is about to change with the introduction of autonomous vehicles. So if it's going to change, let's take a peek into the future just to see some of the elements that are going to change. I believe that the change in our life with the introduction of autonomous vehicles is going to be in every aspect of our daily life: economically, personally, demographically, socially, you name it. It will start with shared mobility or current demand. Regulators will give a very effective way, and when we get out of the public transportation, another car will wait for us. So all the ride will be very efficient, and we will use public transportation much more than we used today because it's going to be so efficient. There's going to be no logic to own a car within those cities. After all, the used car maybe four percent of our time; most of the time it sits in a parking lot. But with autonomous vehicles, the utility will be close to 98%. So the number of cars will drop; some claim to have, and some claim to quarter. So the cities will look different. In the car, we can do whatever we do at home or at work. So because we're not wasting time, we will start to see demographic changes. People will leave the centers of the city and go back to suburbia. But the most important element of it is that we will reach eventually the utopia of safe roads without car accidents.

Another great example of how artificial intelligence can benefit humanity is our second company, OrCam. In 2010, I remember my partner entered my room and said, 'The technology is finally mature enough.' And I said, 'Mature enough to fix my poor vision?' He smiled and said, 'Yes, but I'm not this kind of doctor.' He moved on, but I never forgot this episode. It was 30 years ago. Around 2010, the microprocessors grew stronger, the algorithms became sophisticated enough, allowing technology to reach the maturity on a human level. So we developed OrCam, which works offline, not connected to the internet, so privacy is fully kept, and it works immediately. This device is truly ready. It redefines everything you know about artificial vision. It has been considered the most sophisticated wearable device today in the world. So let's look at a day in the life of Amy. It's a new day. The sun rises, the city is waking up, the streets come alive, and so does Amy. Amy, like all of us, doesn't like... myself and realizes she has to run. Time is 8:15 a.m. 10 Park Street. Believe in yourself. At the coffee shop, Amy gets comfortable. She orders coffee and a snack. Then she meets Mike, my underly Ellie, and someone new. A young man is in front of you, cute. But Amy, you came to the coffee shop to get some work done. After finishing some work, she finally arrives back home. Now she can relax, take off her glasses, sit down, and have a drink. This is the challenging reality of over... you want to match your clothing, so we'll tell you what the colors are. When you walk down the street, we'll help you with orientation with street signs. While shopping, we'll identify millions of products, their prices and description on the product. At the register, we'll help you with money notes and credit cards. We'll tell you the number of the bus and train that you are waiting for. And a big part of our life is socializing, so we'll recognize faces of your close people. But maybe the most important... me, more than 90% said we want the ability to read, you know, not in order to understand it. I did a small experiment on myself. I prevented myself from reading for one day. After an hour, I understood how challenging our life is if we cannot read. I suggest you do it for five minutes. You understand all our world is composed of written material: smartphones, computers, documents, street signs, newspapers, everywhere around us. But if this device and this technology are capable of reading, we can reach additional segments: tens of millions. But maybe the biggest segment that this technology can help is people with reading fatigue, like senior citizens. They still can read but tire very quickly, or professionals that read a lot during the day, like doctors, lawyers, or students. So we can boost their capability to read during the day. So if you combine all of these populations together, it adds up to more than a billion potential users that can use this technology. From people who are partially sighted and blind, we are not just settling to meet their needs. We go beyond their independence. We give them...

Specially to this event from Porto Alegre all the way, and I want to ask her how it changed her life. Julia, please come. So for how long are you using our device? It was... a walk user? Care... sink amis? And how did it change your life? Tell us your experience. Agario... consider a queen... ecfr sigils amoebas... news letters... libras participators... We'll continue to read page after page. Thank you very much, Julia. I opened my presentation with the realization that... I want to leave you with a philosophical question. As a human being, are we really ready for this change? My personal feeling is that we still have a long way to go. The number of casualties caused by human error is outrageous. For example, blizzard drivers are responsible for close to 95% of car accidents, and the numbers are staggering: 1.5 million fatalities, and on top of it, 50 million are injured. And we got off... we embrace technology with more confidence, and then we can enjoy the benefits of artificial intelligence. And on a personal level, I feel privileged to grab this opportunity to take part in this change and influence the lives of so many people. Thank you.