Advanced Computing in the Age of AI | Thursday, March 28, 2024

AI21 Labs Leverage Oxford’s Language Expertise to Advance Research on Deep Language Models 

February 19, 2021 -- Oxford Languages, part of Oxford University Press, is delighted to announce it is providing the richness of language data found in Oxford Languages’ Semantic English Language Database (SELD) to Israeli-based tech company, AI21 Labs, for experimentation and research purposes.

AI21’s writing tool, Wordtune, is the world’s first AI-based writing companion. Wordtune introduces a new writing paradigm where humans and machines work iteratively together to shape ideas into words by combining the power of AI and machine learning technologies with rich language data to allow users to rephrase, condense, and change the tone of their sentences. The ability of Wordtune to rephrase complete sentences and provide other seemingly magical writing assistance, relies on advanced algorithms and sophisticated language models. The creation of these models requires much experimentation early on to get a feel for the performance of various algorithms, and here the Oxford Language’s Semantic English Language Database was indispensable

Casper Grathwohl, President, Oxford Languages, says: “At Oxford Languages, we recognize that technology and AI have the potential to greatly enhance people’s writing experience in their day to day lives. We are pleased to partner with AI21 on this exciting step in the development of writing assistance technology. Effective writing is the cornerstone of good communication, which in turn unlocks new worlds and opportunities for all of us.I look forward to watching AI21 develop into a leading voice in the language technology field.”

Yoav Shoham, Co-Founder at AI21 Labs says: “In the future, humans and machines will increasingly work together to shape ideas into the written word.  The data we received from Oxford was extremely rich with interconnected information, and through our cutting-edge AI technology, allowed us to easily relate the lexical information of a given word to its synonyms, antonyms and other related words in a flexible manner.” 

About AI21 Labs

AI21 Labs was formed by AI luminaries and veterans of the elite technology unit of Israel’s IDF, with the mission of building AI systems with an unprecedented capacity to understand and generate natural language. The company’s first product, Wordtune, is the first AI-based writing companion that understands context and meaning. The company is led by Yoav Shoham, Amnon Shashua, and Ori Goshen. The company’s headquarters are in Tel Aviv, Israel. For more information visit www.AI21.com.

About Oxford Languages

Oxford Languages, part of Oxford University Press, is committed to unlocking the power of language for learning and for life.  Our world-class language research programme builds on over 150 years of experience and technological innovation to deliver authoritative, evidence-based content in more than 50 languages.   From bespoke language datasets to self-service APIs to our flagship Oxford English Dictionary, all Oxford Languages content is uniquely curated and delivered by our expert team of lexicographers, linguists, and language technologists to the highest of standards.  We bring this unparalleled expertise to partnerships across the globe as we work with like-minded innovators to advance learning and communication for future generations.  Trusted by big tech, academic institutions, and local community initiatives alike, our language data is at the forefront of global communication, powering the products, research, and projects that are making language knowledge available to all.


Source: AI21 Labs; Oxford Languages

About the author: Tiffany Trader

With over a decade’s experience covering the HPC space, Tiffany Trader is one of the preeminent voices reporting on advanced scale computing today.

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