Can We Stop the Academic AI Brain Drain?

摘要

The AI research landscape is changing. The distinction between academic research and corporate research labs is vanishing. One of the main reasons for this change is the huge success of (deep) machine learning methods over the last five years or so. Another reason is the tremendous advancement in robotic technology in the last decade. These and other factors have brought the realisation and commercialisation of various real-world applications in computer vision, natural language processing and robotics within reach. This has sparked a substantial increase of investment in AI technologies in industry, business and commerce which has led to a high demand of AI researchers in the US, China, and Europe. As a result, more and more of the most talented graduate and PhD students, postdocs as well as professors and sometimes even whole research teams have left academia to pursue a well-paid career in corporate research.