Automating quality assurance in manufacturing through Autonomous AI will drive flawless quality and production while enabling simple and fast setup on the production line
HONG KONG SAR – 11 November 2021 – Johnson Electric Group and Cortica Group have established a joint venture to build an Autonomous Inspection System set to revolutionize the Quality Inspection Market. Lean AI is a game-changing startup that will leverage Johnson Electric’s vast knowledge and experience in manufacturing processes and Cortica’s unique Autonomous AI Technology in order to revolutionize the visual inspection market.
Today, supervised Deep Learning-Based Quality Assurance Systems can take weeks, up to months, to deploy. The existing systems are reliant on a data scientist or AI experts and require large manually tagged training sets with thousands of defect image examples. Requiring constant maintenance and re-training for the slightest variations, the system is unable to adapt to defects, new products, and new cameras.
Lean AI’s technology surpasses existing challenges of prevalent supervised Deep Learning-Based Quality Assurance Systems with the power of unsupervised learning to process information within a fraction of a second, utilizes unlabeled data, applies predictive quality assurance, and compiles data that increases the speed of deployment and scaling. As an open platform agnostic to camera, defect type and product, Lean AI can collaborate with any integrators, OEMs, and manufacturers of automation solutions.
“With the power of Cortica’s Autonomous AI technology, and JE’s vast knowledge of the market, Lean AI will deliver a product that reduces the cost of human error when it comes to quality inspection in manufacturing and address the vulnerabilities in the current market,” said Karina Odinaev, CEO of Lean AI.
“Johnson Electric is very excited to announce this new joint venture with Cortica. We are fully aware of the fundamental challenges accompanying the deployment of AI-based quality assurance software in the production environment, especially in terms of speed of deployment and reliability over time,” said Austin Wang, Senior Vice President of Johnson Electric. “Cortica’s Autonomous AI technology can address a lot of these major headaches and allow for much faster and broader adoption.”
“Cortica has developed self-learning AI that is fundamentally different from traditional deep learning systems. Autonomous AI Technology operates like a human brain – it’s not a fixed system; instead, it continuously adapts itself to various scenarios and learns online in real-time. Its technology requires far less computing power, can be deployed at a fraction of the cost, and provides far superior performance outcomes,” said Igal Raichelgauz, Founder and Chairman of Cortica. “Our technology is robust and generic and applicable within a multitude of signal domains such as visual, audio, time series and other domains; visual inspection is only the beginning. Autonomous AI technology is quickly becoming the benchmark for the industry.”
The global machine vision market is currently valued at US$11 billion and is forecast to increase to US$15.5 billion by 2026. As these numbers continue to grow and AI technology advances, the opportunity for machine vision solutions to positively aid in manufacturers’ earning potential with a reduction in defects gives way for a new system that will fundamentally change the industry’s approach to quality assurance.
Further commenting on the formation of Lean AI, Austin Wang said: “Johnson Electric’s deep experience in a wide range of manufacturing processes offers a unique platform for developing this technology for commercial use. The joint venture is also opening a new avenue for Johnson Electric to develop and market software offerings. It is therefore both a technological as well as business model innovation for us. There are also opportunities to apply the technology in predictive quality and expert systems as well. This is the second investment of Johnson Electric in Israeli technology and we will continue to assess such relevant opportunities.”
About Johnson Electric Group
The Johnson Electric Group is a global leader in electric motors, actuators, motion subsystems and related electro-mechanical components. It serves a broad range of industries including Automotive, Smart Metering, Medical Devices, Business Equipment, Home Automation, Ventilation, White Goods, Power Tools, and Lawn & Garden Equipment. The Group is headquartered in Hong Kong and employs over 35,000 individuals in 22 countries worldwide. Johnson Electric Holdings Limited is listed on The Stock Exchange of Hong Kong Limited (Stock Code: 179).
About Cortica Group
Cortica Group has developed Autonomous AI that simulates the natural processes of the mammal cortex. Its unsupervised approach to learning mimics the way the brain processes information: enabling machines to learn, collaborate and interact with the world without human input. The technology is backed by more than 250 patents and patent applications and 10 years of cutting-edge research and is revolutionizing visual intelligence for a smarter and safer world.
