Corporate bits | Sands China participates in clean plate challenge

In support of World Hunger Day, Sands China Ltd. team members participated in the Clean Plate Challenge from May 23 to 25.

It is the company’s fourth consecutive year supporting World Hunger Day, which is held annually on May 28 to raise public awareness about the worldwide problem of hunger and starvation.

For this year’s event, team members met their new participation target by completing the Clean Plate Challenge a total of 83,000 times, up from last year’s target of 60,000, as cited in a statement issued by the gaming operator.

In the days leading up to the Clean Plate Challenge, team members had the opportunity to support the work of Oxfam in Macau by becoming donors and by purchasing rice packs, the funds from which will go toward supporting smallholder farmers.

Team members also donated dry foods to the Fuhong Society of Macau.

Apple said to plan dedicated chip to power ai on devices

Apple Inc. got an early start in artificial intelligence software with the 2011 introduction of Siri, a tool that lets users operate their smartphones with voice commands. Now the electronics giant is bringing artificial intelligence to chips.

Apple is working on a processor devoted specifically to AI-related tasks, according to a person familiar with the matter. The chip, known internally as the Apple Neural Engine, would improve the way the company’s devices handle tasks that would otherwise require human intelligence – such as facial recognition and speech recognition, said the person, who requested anonymity discussing a product that hasn’t been made public. Apple declined to comment.

Engineers at Apple are racing to catch their peers at Amazon.com Inc. and Alphabet Inc. in the booming field of artificial intelligence. While Siri gave Apple an early advantage in voice-recognition, competitors have since been more aggressive in deploying AI across their product lines, including Amazon’s Echo and Google’s Home digital assistants. An AI-enabled processor would help Cupertino, California-based Apple integrate more advanced capabilities into devices, particularly cars that drive themselves and gadgets that run augmented reality, the technology that superimposes graphics and other information onto a person’s view of the world.