On November 12, 2019, Udacity announced the Intel® Edge AI Scholarship Program to train professional developers in next generation skills for Computer vision and AI at the edge. Today, we are proud to share that the Intel® Edge AI for IoT Developers Nanodegree program is now open for enrollment to all. The 850 Intel® Edge AI Scholarship Program recipients will be joining the premiere class of this program as well. The Intel® Edge AI Fundamentals with OpenVINO™ free course is now also open for enrollment to all students.
“This program is part of Udacity’s commitment to provide training for 1 million developers worldwide,” said Gabe Dalporto, CEO of Udacity. “Our collaboration with Intel® will open the doors for students to learn deployment of cutting-edge AI technologies at the edge and aid those with limited access to educational resources to grow in their fields.”
What is Edge AI?
Edge Computing runs processes locally on the device itself, instead of running them in the cloud. This reduced computing time allows data to be processed much faster, removes the security risk of transferring the data to a cloud-based server, and reduces the cost of data transfer, as well as the risks of bandwidth outages disrupting performance.
“Historically, students have learned how to build and deploy deep learning models for the cloud,” said Jonathan Ballon, Intel® Vice President and General Manager, Internet of Things Group. “With Udacity, we are training the next generation of AI developers to go where the data is generated in the physical world: at the Edge. Optimizing direct deployment of models on edge devices requires knowledge of unique constraints like power, network bandwidth and latency, varying compute architectures and more. The skills this class delivers will allow students to implement learnings on real-world applications across a variety of fields.”
Real-World Applications
The aim of this program is to empower professional developers interested in advanced learning, specifically deep learning and computer vision, to accelerate the development and deployment of high-performance computer vision and deep learning solutions.
Computer vision and AI at the edge are becoming instrumental in powering everything from factory assembly lines and retail inventory management, to urgent care medical imaging equipment — like X-ray and CAT scans. Drones, security cameras, robots, facial recognition on cell phones, self-driving vehicles, among others use this technology, as well. According to Ballon, since 70% of data being created is at the edge and only half of that will go to the public cloud, the rest will be stored and processed at the edge, which requires a different kind of developer. (VentureBeat) Demand for professionals with these skills will be immense, as the Edge Artificial Intelligence (AI) software market size is forecasted to grow from $355 Million in 2018, to $1,152 Billion by 2023, at an Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 27%. (MarketWatch)
Intel Edge AI for IoT Developers Nanodegree Program Details
The Intel® Edge AI for IoT Developers Nanodegree Program will introduce students to the Intel® Distribution of OpenVINO™ Toolkit, which allows developers to deploy pre-trained deep learning models through a high-level C++ or Python inference engine API integrated with application logic. Based on convolutional neural networks (CNN), the Intel® Distribution of OpenVINO™ Toolkit will allow graduates to maximize application performance across a range of heterogeneous Intel® architectures to deliver fast, efficient deep learning workloads. Students can also take advantage of Intel® DevCloud for the Edge to develop, test and run their workloads on a cluster of the latest Intel® hardware and software.
The graduates of the Intel® Edge AI for IoT Developers Nanodegree program will understand how to accelerate the development and deployment of high-performance computer vision and deep learning solutions using a wide range of silicon and the Intel® Distribution of OpenVINO™ toolkit.
The Intel® Edge AI Fundamentals with OpenVINO™ free course, now open for enrollment to all students, has the same content as the first course in the Intel® Edge AI for IoT Developers Nanodegree program (three courses in total), but will not include technical mentor support, the real-world projects to apply your skills and build your portfolio, or the certificate of graduation that comes with the full Nanodegree program.
Program Details
Students will learn directly from experienced professionals in the Edge AI and IoT field, including Stewart Christie, who has been with Intel® for almost 20 years, and is currently the Community Manager of the Internet of Things Developer Program; Vaidheeswaran Archana, graduate student at NUS; Soham Chatterjee, graduate student at NTU; and Michel Virgo, Senior Curriculum Manager at Udacity.
Projects in the Nanodegree program include:
- Deploy a People Counter at the Edge: Investigate different pre-trained models for person detection, and detect the number of people in the frame, and the time spent there.
- Design a Smart Queuing System: Build custom queuing systems for the retail, manufacturing and transportation sectors and use the Intel® DevCloud for the Edge to test your solutions performance.
- Build a Computer Pointer Controller: Use models available in the Intel® Distribution of OpenVINO™ Toolkit to control your computer pointer using your eye gaze
Are you ready to advance your deep learning and computer vision skills? Are you ready to get your hands dirty using the Intel® Distribution of OpenVINO™ toolkit? Then enroll in the Intel® Edge AI for IoT Developers Nanodegree program today!
