Twitter acquires deep learning startup Fabula AI to tackle fake news
The London-based startup applies ‘graph deep learning’ to network-structured data to analyse complex datasets and extract signals in ways that traditional ML techniques cannot.
Twitter on Monday announced it has acquired London-based deep learning startup Fabula AI. The startup, founded by Michael Bronstein, Damon Mannion, Federico Monti, and Ernesto Schmitt, will be joining Twitter's research team, led by Sandeep Pandey.
With Fabula on board, Twitter first aims to expand applications to stop spam and abuse, and improve the health of the conversation on the platform.
The startup applies ‘graph deep learning’ to network-structured data to analyse complex data sets and extract signals in ways that traditional Machine Learning techniques are not capable of doing.
In an official statement, Twitter called the acquisition a strategic investment in graph deep learning research, technology, and talent to make the users feel safe on Twitter. The company also said,
“By studying and understanding the Twitter graph, comprised of the millions of tweets, retweets, and likes shared on Twitter every day, we will be able to improve the health of the conversation as well as products including the timeline, recommendations, the explore tab and the onboarding experience.”
Fabula is currently led by Chief Scientist Michael Bronstein, who is also the Co-founder, and Chief Technologist Federico Monti, who collaborated together while at the University of Lugano in Switzerland.
Michael Bronstein also heads Machine Learning and Pattern Recognition at Imperial College. Speaking on joining Twitter, he said,
“We are really excited to join the Machine Learning (ML) research team at Twitter, and work together to grow their team and capabilities. Specifically, we are looking forward to applying our graph deep learning techniques to improving the health of the conversation across the service.”
With this acquisition, Twitter plans to work more efficiently on few key strategic areas such as natural language processing, reinforcement ML ethics, recommendation systems, and graph deep learning.
Twitter’s other investments in ML include Madbits in 2014, Whetlab in 2015, and Magic Pony in 2016.
1555928066153.png?fm=png&auto=format&h=100&w=100&crop=entropy&fit=crop)