Grab, the Southeast Asian ride-hailing, food, and payments giant, said that it will be spending $150 million on artificial intelligence over the next 12 months, Bloomberg reports.
The startup, which has already spent $100 million on the technology over the past year, aims to use AI to scale itself more effectively while at the same time, improve its fraud prevention, mapping, and natural language processing (NLP) technology.
In an interview with Bloomberg TV, Grab co-founder Tan Hooi Ling said that “no other company in Southeast Asia has invested that much in AI,” adding that they want to move from being “AI-powered to AI everywhere.” Tan, however, was quick to point out that they’re not building up on AI just for entertainment value:
“What’s most important for us is using technology for the sake of solving specific customer problems, and that’s the same for AI. So we don’t build AI for the sake of AI.”
Grab is also working with Microsoft on facial recognition and NLPs in a bid to make the company’s ride hailing, food delivery, and digital payments services safer and more accessible to users in the various markets. “Localized languages in Southeast Asia are underserved,” said Tan, so they’re building “localized, segmented technology” to better cater to them.
Photo: RISE