A Dive into Edge AI Advancements

The convergence of advanced AI capabilities, widespread IoT device adoption, and the potency of edge computing has unleashed the potential of edge AI. This transformative synergy encompasses applications such as aiding medical diagnostics, achieving autonomous driving, and warehouse logistics automation.

Originating from the 1990s with content delivery networks, edge computing is now widely used, especially in the field of edge AI. Businesses recognize the broad spectrum of benefits offered by edge AI, marking it as a pivotal force propelling the next era of AI computing, impacting home life, work environments, education, and transportation. In this article, we will delve into the world of edge AI, understand its working principles, explore its benefits and applications, and glimpse into the future of this transformative technology.

What Is Edge AI?

The Concept of Edge AI

Simply described, edge AI, or "AI on the edge," is the integration of edge computing and artificial intelligence to perform machine learning tasks directly on networked edge devices.  Edge AI is the implementation of artificial intelligence in edge computing environments, enabling computations to take place close to the actual data collection point rather than being centralized in cloud computing facilities or private data centers. It can be a retail store, factory, hospital or devices all around us, like traffic lights, autonomous machines and phones.

Opportunities in the Advancement of Edge AI

Organizations in every industry are seeking opportunities to enhance automation for improved efficiency and safety. The advancements in edge artificial intelligence precisely offer opportunities for the elevation of machines and devices.

The development of edge AI mainly stems from three technological innovations:

• 1. Maturation of Neural Networks: The neural networks and associated AI infrastructure have evolved to a level enabling machine learning. Currently, organizations are in the process of training AI models and deploying them into edge production.

• 2. Advances in Compute Infrastructure: The recent development of highly parallel GPUs is now applicable to executing neural networks, providing robust distributed computational power support for the advancement of edge AI. For more details, please read the post Why GPUs Are so Crucial for AI?

• 3. Application of IoT Devices: The widespread adoption of IoT devices has led to a surge in big data, allowing businesses to collect data from various sources, including industrial sensors, smart cameras, and robots. This abundance of data and devices facilitates the deployment of AI models at the edge, further enhanced by the faster, more stable, and secure connectivity offered by 5G.

Why Deploy AI at the Edge and What Are the Benefits of Edge AI? 

The integration of artificial intelligence and edge computing brings about significant advantages. Edge AI enhances computing capabilities at the edge, where sensors and IoT devices are situated.  Due to latency, bandwidth, and privacy concerns, these AI applications would be difficult to implement in a centralized cloud or business data center. By aggregating data locally, users can save time without requiring communication with other physical locations.  

The benefits of edge AI include:

• Reduce Costs: Energy costs can be saved through local data processing, and the application's demand for Internet bandwidth is reduced, greatly reducing costs.

• Improved Security:Edge AI processes data locally and only uploads analysis and insights to the cloud, reducing the risk of data being stolen or mishandled. It can also filter redundant or irrelevant data to prioritize important data transfers.

• High Availability:The robustness of edge AI is enhanced by decentralization and offline capabilities, eliminating the necessity for internet access during data processing. This leads to increased availability and reliability, particularly beneficial for mission-critical and production-grade AI applications.

• Continuous Enhancement:The precision of AI models advances with ongoing exposure to additional data. When faced with data that an edge AI application struggles to process accurately or confidently, it usually uploads the data for retraining and learning. Consequently, the longer a model operates at the edge, the greater its accuracy becomes.

Edge AI Applications

How Does Edge AI Technology Work?

Edge AI leverages neural networks and deep learning to train models for precise identification, classification, and description of objects in the provided data. Typically, this training process involves a centralized data center or cloud to handle the significant data volume required for model training.

Following deployment, edge AI models continually enhance their performance. In the event of encountering an issue, the problematic data is often sent to the cloud for additional training of the initial AI model. Eventually, the refined model replaces the inference engine at the edge. This iterative process significantly contributes to the continuous improvement of model performance.

Practical Applications of Edge AI

In fields such as manufacturing, healthcare, financial services, transportation, energy, and more, edge artificial intelligence is driving new business outcomes in each sector, as outlined below:

• Manufacturing Industry: Edge artificial intelligence can proactively identify anomalies and predict machine failures using sensor data. Equipment sensors can also pinpoint defects and alert management, enabling timely issue resolution and preventing downtime.

• Healthcare: Edge artificial intelligence is integrating with medical devices, such as equipping ambulances with rapid data processing capabilities. This allows healthcare professionals to promptly assess patient conditions and make adequate preparations.

• Retail Industry: With the popularity of e-commerce and online shopping, traditional retail physical stores are also gradually innovating. Retailers use smart shopping carts with sensors and smart checkout technology to upgrade customers' shopping experience.

• Energy Industry: Edge artificial intelligence can integrate historical data, weather conditions, grid status, and other information to create complex simulations, providing more efficient energy information and ensuring a secure energy supply.

The Combination of Cloud Computing and Edge AI

AI applications can operate within a data center, such as those found in public clouds, or in the field at the edge of the network, closer to the user. Both cloud computing and edge computing bring unique advantages that can be synergized when deploying edge AI.

The cloud provides benefits concerning infrastructure cost, scalability, high utilization, resilience against server failure, and collaborative capabilities. Cloud computing can support edge AI deployment in various ways, such as running models during training and providing the latest versions of AI models and applications. On the other hand, edge computing offers advantages like faster response times, reduced bandwidth costs, and resilience against network failure.

FS provides a range of software to manage and promote security cost-effectively across hundreds of thousands of edge devices, enabling configuration management, monitoring, and maintenance of your edge AI infrastructure, including the PicOS® family, PicOS-V and AmpCon™ Network Manager. With PicOS®, deliver highly resilient, highly reliable, programmable networks that are leaner and more scalable than their monolithic predecessors. AmpCon™ automates network lifecycle management to save you time while eliminating errors that lead to costly network downtime. These devices can help you better deploy your edge artificial intelligence organization.

The Outlook for Edge AI

With the maturity of neural networks, widespread adoption of IoT devices, advancements in parallel computing, and the advent of 5G technology, a robust infrastructure for generalized machine learning has emerged. This development empowers businesses to embrace AI within their operations, leveraging real-time insights while simultaneously reducing costs and enhancing privacy.

FS is a leading network solutions provider, offering innovative, effective, and reliable products, solutions, and services to meet the diversified demands of our customers. Contact us to discuss your unique requirements and create a bespoke solution. Let us help you realize your network's full potential.