AsianScientist (Feb. 23, 2012) – The Institute for Infocomm Research (I²R), a research institute of the Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR), signed an agreement today to establish a joint laboratory with Baidu, Inc., the leading Chinese language Internet search provider.

Called the Baidu-I²R Research Center (BIRC), the joint laboratory will operate as an R&D unit at the Fusionopolis research complex in Singapore.

The announcement was made earlier today at the signing ceremony in Beijing, attended by Ms. Wang Mengqiu, Vice President of Baidu, and Dr. Tan Geok Leng, Acting Executive Director of I²R.

According to the press report, the launch of BIRC marks an important step in Baidu’s commitment to enhance its products in Southeast Asia. Initially, the lab will focus on foundational Natural Language Processing (NLP) technologies for Southeast Asian languages, such as Vietnamese and Thai.

For example, using I2R’s natural language processing technology, users will first input their native language into the search engine and Baidu’s “Box Computing” will return precise results to the user.

“Baidu is thrilled to be joining forces with I²R for this joint laboratory. Our overlap and complementary expertise in our research areas make us perfect partners,” said Wang Mengqiu, Vice President of Baidu. “Together with I²R, we are laying the foundations to deliver an equally good user experience to users in other markets,” she said.

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Source: A*STAR.

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