[Photo by Han Joon-ho]
South Korea's top search giant Naver and its Japanese subsidiary LINE will start a joint operation with Sony to develop artificial intelligence technology.
The operation, called "Project J" and disclosed at the 2017 Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, is designed to combine Sony's smart devices and LINE's artificial intelligence (AI) platform.
Details were not given, but experts speculate that Sony's smart devices would be installed with an AI-based voice assistant. Tech companies such as Google, Amazon, Microsoft and Samsung are developing AI assistants for smartphones and other devices.
South Korea is the latecomer in the AI industry. Telecom firms KT and SKT developed AI-assistant home devices in a shape of speakers last year but are not yet widely used.
LINE, a free messenger app launched in Japan in 2011, has about 200 million Japanese users. It is also popular in Indonesia, Thailand and Taiwan. LINE has tried to apply AI to its messenger platform while Naver focused on an AI-based autonomous car project.
Park Sae-jin = swatchsjp@ajunews.com
reporter
Park Sae-jin
swatchsjp@ajunews.com
