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Massachusetts Institute of Technology has announced a $1bn commitment to computing and artificial intelligence that will see the size of its faculty in these fields near double, based on a $350m gift from Stephen Schwarzman, chief executive and co-founder of the global private equity group Blackstone.
MIT said the initiative would be the largest investment in computing and AI ever made by an American university, and its biggest structural change since the 1950s when academics at MIT started pioneering research into AI.
A “signature new building” on MIT’s Cambridge campus outside Boston, to be completed by 2022, will house the Schwarzman College of Computing. Fifty faculty positions will be created, which will, in turn, lead to a larger influx of graduate researchers.
“We are reshaping MIT,” said Rafael Reif, president of MIT. “The Schwarzman College will constitute both a global centre for computing research and education, and an intellectual foundry for powerful new AI tools.”
An equally important role will be to equip students and researchers in other disciplines, such as economics, linguistics and urban studies, to use computing and AI to advance their work. The idea, said Martin Schmidt, MIT provost, is to create “bilinguals — people who are as fluent in computing and AI as they are in their own disciplines”.
Mr Schwarzman said in a statement: “As one of the world leaders in technological innovation, MIT has the right expertise and the right values to serve as the ‘true north’ of AI in pursuit of the answers we urgently need . . . Our hope is that this ambitious initiative serves as a clarion call to our government that massive financial investment in AI is necessary to ensure that America has a leading voice in shaping the future of these powerful and transformative technologies.”
Prof Reif said MIT started serious discussions with Mr Schwarzman about his gift early this year, with a final decision to go ahead made in the summer. MIT trustees approved the new college’s establishment this month.
In addition to Mr Schwarzman’s $350m, other donors have committed a total of $300m, leaving MIT with $350m still to raise to achieve its $1bn target.
In February the university announced a focused programme of AI research called MIT Quest for Intelligence. The initiative is more broadly based, encompassing education as much as research.
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