Yahoo! Inc. (YHOO) recently announced a 5-year research collaboration agreement between Yahoo! Labs and Carnegie Mellon University (CMU). The partnership, called Project InMind, will cost Yahoo! $10 million. The idea is to use Yahoo!’s data and CMU’s brain trust to build smartphone apps of the future.
CMU researchers will be able to access Yahoo!’s real-time data services and infrastructure through its “mobile toolkit.”
The mobile toolkit will assist researchers to apply new machine learning and interface technologies to Yahoo!’s raw data to develop algorithms that could predict human behavior.
The alliance could prove to be advantageous for Yahoo! and help it to make progress in the development of next generation intuitive technology. Intuitive technology incorporates mobile apps or search engines, which anticipate the user’s question and answer even before the question is asked.
The agreement also includes a new Yahoo-sponsored fellowship program that will provide financial and research support to computer science students and faculty members interested in machine learning and related technologies at CMU.
Yahoo! Labs, a division of Yahoo!, established in 2005 is responsible for research into the science of the Internet. It creates next generation businesses for Yahoo! and innovates in numerous research areas like machine learning, personalization, mobile, advertising science, image processing, natural language processing, among other things.
The Carnegie Mellon School of Computer Science is one of the world’s top institutions for research in computer science and artificial intelligence. It already has partnerships with Apple Inc. (AAPL), Google Inc. (GOOG), Oracle Corp. (ORCL), Intel (INTC) and Microsoft (MSFT).
Many of Yahoo!’s recent acquisitions have been made with the intention of beefing up its mobile business. Recently, the Internet portal acquired a mobile-marketing company called Sparq, a virtual gaming company called Cloud Party and an enterprise app developer called Tomfoolery.
Currently, Yahoo! holds a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold).
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