“We hope to develop an AEI service that correctly interprets human emotion such that when an input is presented, it is able to recognise the emotional content accurately, process it, and then act appropriately,” says Oh. This is critical because once the computer detects and recognises an emotion; it can be programmed to synthesise that emotion.

AEI-Based Apps

Neil is an AEI curator for news. It is a chatbot that learns what a person likes, and then finds noteworthy content to match those tastes while learning the user’s personality. It serves as a private, ad-free chatbot, and a virtual assistant whose goal is to find reputable articles on a specific topic or genre.

Another offering from BPU Holdings, aiMei is a sophisticated AEI bot framework that can be used to develop digital assistants for medical, political, human resources, customer service, and many other applications. Currently, the company is testing a new version of the aiMei framework, in the medical field. aiMei can proactively interact with the individual, communicating directly with monitoring devices to measure user activity and overall emotional and physical health. It can ask questions to determine the mental or emotional states of patients and recognise potential scenarios of self-harm and recognise pattern-based ailments such as depression. In hospitals, aiMei framework can be used to supplement nurses who are in high demand and provide patients with a near-constant caretaker.

The First AEI Platform

BPU Holdings’ ZimOS is the first of its kind AEI platform that emulates how people think and feel. “We have developed ZimOS–BPU’s Operating System Cloud service that encapsulates all of our products and services,” explains Oh. This allows enterprises to customise AI and direct AEI to more personalised, emotional emulations. ZimOS is also a way to begin the actual interaction between humans and machine, by allowing it to express “needs” and “wants.” While the platform is in its initial stage, introducing the notion of needs/wants helps create a self-interest model for machines. “And while it’s contrived, and feels completely synthetic and unnatural today, at some point this will become the standard,” says Oh. ZimOS acts as a personal AI that learns to securely and automatically assist users. While ZimOS was built in-house, it will eventually be open source and freely accessible to the world. BPU Holdings believes that all other IoT devices will be equipped with ZimOS in the future.

Giving Back to Society

Apart from leading the research and development of AEI, BPU Holdings follows a unique culture where all employees are considered family. Like many technology startups, BPU Holdings was on the brink of failure multiple times; and at one point, the company was running out of funds, struggling to keep its servers running and keeping its office space. During such difficult times, the company could not afford to compensate its employees for almost 10months. However, not one person resigned and a few even made personal contributions to sustain the company. This continued until the company received a $5 million institutional investment, after which it was able to successfully raise an additional $60 million through crowdfunding. Persevering through such burdensome days, Oh decided to grant a lunch allowance for all of his employees every day as a reminder to never take things for granted. Furthermore, BPU Holdings allocates 30 percent of its profits for the public good.

Despite its humble beginnings, BPU Holdings has already established itself as a global enterprise with offices in Seoul, Las Vegas, and Sarajevo. The company continues to advance the understanding, design, and value of AEI based technology.