Israeli startup Hailo, a deep-learning company providing AI chip technology for smart edge devices, announced that it’s expanding into the ‘land of the rising sun’, with the establishment of Hailo Japan G.K. The newly founded Japanese company is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Hailo, and is located in Tokyo.
Uchida ticks all the right boxes
Former Sony executive, Hiro Uchida, has been appointed to lead the Japan-based Hailo operations, offering from his over 30 years experience in technology and business, as he’s determined to bring the same innovative efforts to this Israeli-Japanese endeavor as he previously did at Sony or as President of SiTime KK and President of Tessera Technologies Japan GK. This becomes a natural fit with Hailo’s Japanese and Asia expansion aspirations.
“I am excited to be part of Hailo’s team and am looking forward to building a strong foundation to lead our business development in this pivotal arena,” said President Hiro Uchida. “There is no doubt that deep learning at the edge will be embedded in almost all of the products and services we use on a daily basis while providing us with improved safety and better quality of life. Hailo is spearheading the next generation of deep learning and I look forward to working closely with our customers and partners to innovate industries across the board.”
As the world of tech digs deeper down the Artificial Intelligence rabbit hole, Israeli AI-empowering chip developer sees demand go up and is aiming to jump the gun, and establish a footprint in Asia-Pacific to support the growing demand of Japanese customers, who develop technologies that require AI-powered technology at the edge. Hailo Japan will allow the Israeli-based company to better serve Asia-based customers, while also opening the door to grow in market segments such as automotive, smart cities, smart retail, smart homes, industry 4.0, and beyond.
The company’s specialized Hailo-8 Deep Learning Processor features up to 26 Tera Operations Per Second (TOPS). The chip is built with an innovative architecture that enables edge devices to run sophisticated deep learning applications that could previously only run on the cloud. Its advanced structure translates into higher performance, lower power, and minimal latency, enabling enhanced privacy and better reliability for smart devices operating at the edge.
The Japanese tech ecosystem seems hot on Hailo’s tail, as the expansion comes in the wake of Hailo’s $60 million Series B funding round, in which Japanese corporation NEC, a leader in the integration of IT and network technologies, joined as a strategic investor. Hailo, which was founded in 2017 by former elite IDF technological unit specialists, has also recently established key partnerships with Socionext, a major provider of advanced SoC solutions for video and imaging systems headquartered in Japan, and with Foxconn, a global leader in smart manufacturing, to launch a next-generation AI processing solution for video analytics at the edge.
“We look forward to expanding Hailo’s presence in the Asia-Pacific region, which continues to show significant growth in the AI sector,” said Orr Danon, CEO of Hailo. “Our new subsidiary in Japan will enable us to strengthen relationships and collaborations with our Japanese-based customers and partners, and to create new opportunities together. Many of the world’s leading companies integrating Artificial Intelligence into their edge devices are based in Japan, and we are excited to empower their products with our groundbreaking Hailo-8 Deep Learning chip. Hiro Uchida’s leadership, rich experience, innovative spirit and in-depth knowledge of the business/technology ecosystem will allow us to enhance our presence in the Japanese market.”
