AI Next

In September 2018, DARPA announced a multi-year investment of more than $2 billion on artificial intelligence research and development in a portfolio of some 50 new and existing programs collectively called the “AI Next” campaign. 

Key areas of the ambitious campaign include:

• automating critical DoD business processes, such as security-clearance vetting or accrediting software systems for operational deployment; 
• improving the robustness and reliability of AI systems; 
• enhancing the security and resiliency of machine learning and AI technologies; 
• reducing power, data, and performance inefficiencies; 
• pioneering the next generation of AI algorithms and applications, such as ones featuring “explainability”—in which the AI “reasoning” underlying a result can be explained in ways that human intelligence can understand—and common-sense reasoning. 

AI Next builds on AI technology development at DARPA extending back to the 1960s when J.C.R. Licklider, one of DARPA’s most storied and visionary program managers, oversaw formative research into the symbiosis of human and artificial intelligence.