Google Cloud and Simple Technology Solutions (STS) will work with the US Navy to modernize the maintenance, inspection, and repairs for US Navy vessels. STS is a federal contractor and Google Cloud partner, and will utilize Google Cloud’s Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) tools to work with US Navy.
STS already has experience in creating cloud systems while working with the US federal government. The company managed to bag the US Navy contract under the Phase I Small Business Innovation Research project.
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What is the STS-US Navy Deal?
The project will initially start with STS training Google Cloud’s AI and ML projects on a vast number of images to identify corrosion. This usage of AI and ML technology will ensure a certain degree of relative pace and safety for an otherwise very labor-intensive process. The AI/ML model will be built on Google Cloud’s custom model service AutoML. The images used initially will be sourced from public domain and drone inspection of vessels.
As the next part of the project, STS will seek guidance from Navy’s corrosion SMEs to label and train the data acquired. This process will be completed with the help of Google Cloud’s AI Platform Data Labelling Service.
The data model will be then further trained and validated by utilizing the drone inspection data. After the data is uploaded to Google Cloud for processing, it will continue to improve and update itself based on the new data that is fed into it.
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Mike Daniels, the vice president of Global Public Sector at Google Cloud, spoke about the US Navy project, “The manual inspection of Navy ships and vessels is a time-intensive, costly process that can drive up costs and slow down deployment. We’re proud to work with the U.S. Navy and empower them with Google Cloud technology to transform corrosion inspections for greater efficiency and safety.”
Aaron Kilinski, the CTO at STS, added, “This is about automation, saving time and money, and keeping inspectors out of harm’s way. The ultimate goal, however, is to move from detection to prediction by expanding the subjects and sensors, and eventually integrating with Navy systems.”
While Google may be the sub-contractor for the Navy project in this case, it does have experience in working with the public sector. The Californian IT giant has previously used its AI capabilities to aid maintenance and safety with various partners. One among such prominent partners is the City of Memphis, where Google’s solution helps the city administration automatically detect potholes on the streets.
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