The grant was established in 2018, with the tech giant allotting a total of $25 million for funding artificial intelligence-powered, accessibility-focused projects over the course of five years. Each chosen company receives a one-year grant consisting of funding, engineering support and free use of Microsoft’s Azure AI platform.
Here are the seven new AI for Accessibility grantees.
- University of California Berkeley: The university’s Video and Image Processing Lab is developing an app that uses a smartphone’s sensors and cameras to provide captions and audio descriptions of surroundings for vision-impaired users.
- Massachusetts Eye and Ear: The Harvard Medical School teaching hospital’s SuperVision Search app guides vision-impaired users in 12 cities to exact bus stop locations.
- Voiceitt: The Israeli startup is building speech recognition technology that can comprehend non-standard speech patterns, improving communication for people with speech disabilities.
- Birmingham City University: Researchers at the English institution are creating assistive technology that will allow individuals with limited mobility to use voice commands and eye movements to control digital platforms.
- University of Sydney: The Australian university’s scientists are developing a real-time brain signal processing system that can predict when an epilepsy patient’s next seizure will strike.
- Pison Technology: The Boston-based company’s wearable neuromuscular sensing device enables easier communication for users with neuromuscular disabilities such as ALS and MS via microgesture-based control of digital platforms.
- Our Ability: The nonprofit, based in Glenmont, N.Y., fosters more inclusive hiring practices in scientific fields by helping people with cognitive disabilities prepare for job interviews with the help of an AI-enabled chatbot.
More articles about AI:
Machine learning detects high-risk lung nodules in radiology reports
Optum funnels $16M into AI startup Health[at]Scale
IBM’s AI distinguishes between healthy, cancerous cells in breast tumors
