Ford Acquires 10% Stake in L.A. Software Company
Ford Motor said Thursday that it has acquired a 10% interest in Los Angeles-based Inference Corp., an artificial intelligence software company.
Ford, the nation’s second-largest auto maker, valued the deal at $14 million based on equity investment, development contracts and technology transfer agreements. The auto company said it made a similar investment in another artificial intelligence company, Pittsburgh-based Carnegie Group Inc., bringing the total value of the deals to $28 million.
Artificial intelligence, which is the ability to program computers so that they can learn from experience, takes in activities ranging from robotics to talking machines.
Inference markets a so-called expert system software program, known as Automated Reasoning Tool, to industries in the fields of manufacturing, aerospace and financial services. An expert system is computer software that has human problem-solving capabilities in a particular field.
“We believe that artificial intelligence technology has progressed to the point that expert systems will have practical value to Ford in its design, manufacturing and financial activities,” Ford President Harold A. Poling said in a statement.
Dick Judy, Ford spokesman, said the move was Ford’s first technology linkup in the artificial intelligence field related to automotive manufacturing.
Inference said that, in the first year of the agreement, it would develop four expert systems for use in Ford’s business operations.
Norman Lewis, director of information systems at Ford, said two of the projects would be the development of an expert system for approving credit and another for the design and diagnosis of brake systems.
Later projects might include an expert system for industrial engineering stands in the manufacturing process, he said.
The announcement is another example of the auto industry’s recent diversification into areas as diverse as aerospace and financial services. In August, for example, Ford agreed to acquire First Nationwide Financial Corp., one of the country’s largest savings and loan holding companies, for $493 million.
