Microsoft Video AI Cloud Services Examined

By Brian Karas, Published Jul 18, 2017, 09:54am EDT

Microsoft has released one of the most amazing video analytics marketing videos ever. In it, they detect oil spills, track individual people giving them specific directions to avoid oil spills, send alerts if patients have engaged in too much activity, tell nurses the exact location of the nearest free wheelchair, answer questions on where the nearest hot saw is and more. Watch the video below:

Is Microsoft going to disrupt video analytics? IPVM spoke with Milan Gada [link no longer available], Microsoft's program manager for their video AI cloud services to learn what the company is working on and what they are releasing for video analytics.

In this report we analyze the potential for Microsoft to become a major player in video analytics.

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Comments (9)

Itamar Kerbel

07/18/17 02:15pm

Again and great example how the marketing people and R&D work together....

Undisclosed #1

07/18/17 04:01pm

About time.

guy fauquembergue

07/18/17 04:48pm

Hi everybody I have done some test with images sent by ip camera and must say that Microsoft, Google, Amazon, IBM where not that good in that exercise. Clarifai is the only one able to detect background and foreground human shapes with grayscale images. The issue is that you need to get a good Internet connection, this is not something obvious for many sites particularly in France. I have done those test on an Odroid box (Raspberry pi clone).

Warren Tilbrook

07/19/17 01:57pm

Seriously, most construction guys just shout "go get the hot saw". Not sure that market is ready for video analytics.

Great video but highlights the perennial issue of VA marketing far outstripping practical use.

It is coming i'm sure, but it's been coming for 10 years.

Brian Karas

IPVM | In reply to Warren Tilbrook | 07/19/17 02:53pm

Seriously, most construction guys just shout "go get the hot saw". Not sure that market is ready for video analytics.

I agree, not to mention the demo video showed several cases of people getting push alerts to their mobile phones, and then checking their phones while walking or talking to others. That would lead to a lot of distractions, generally something you do not want to encourage in environments with hazardous conditions.

Charles Baker

In reply to Warren Tilbrook | 07/25/17 03:09pm

Agreed. And a nurse really needs a "system" to tell him/her where to find a wheelchair?Sounds like engineers dreaming up needs rather than talking with actual end users to find out what their pain points are.

Undisclosed #2

In reply to Charles Baker | 07/25/17 03:33pm

Not necessarily disagreeing, but my wife works as a CNA and some facilities are worse than others when it comes to keeping track of equipment. If it actually worked, I could see a lot of value in being able to ask a system "where is the hoyer lift?" and getting a response within a few seconds like "room 15a".

Then again, facilities actually willing to invest in something like this would likely see less of a return on investment in the form of saved time compared to the disorganized facilities, and who knows how many years it would take to recoup the cost of the system in saved man hours considering how low the wages are for most in that profession.

Nurses get paid much better, but they're not usually the ones running around tracking down wheelchairs or other equipment.

Alexander Ryltsov

07/19/17 10:14pm

Just compare with their other video, specifically 4:00 - 4:15:

They say this is done in realtime (see 2:30 - emphasizing 27M recognitions per second), still making me pessimistic as even such small environment require(?) 27MRps.

Jon Dillabaugh

Pro Focus LLC
07/20/17 02:04am

Lots of Chinese cameras in that video... Dahua, Hikvision, and I believe some UNI too.

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