The UK is a center of extraordinary technological innovation with incredible talent and world-class institutions. Later this year, Google will build on this heritage by establishing our landmark King’s Cross building in London alongside a historic European railway hub.
Today, we’re unveiling the building’s name, Platform 37, and plans for The AI Exchange, a new public space dedicated to deepening understanding of artificial intelligence.
Platform 37: A hub for AI innovation
The name is a nod to the building’s location next to King’s Cross station and to “Move 37,” a pivotal play made by DeepMind’s AI system AlphaGo in a now-legendary 2016 match against Go world champion Lee Sae Dol. Go is incredibly complex, with more possible board configurations than the number of atoms in the known universe, and has long been a proving ground for AI research. “Move 37” was so unconventional that human experts initially thought it was a mistake. But as the game unfolded, it became clear it enabled AlphaGo to win the game.
AlphaGo’s victory heralded the beginning of what is now recognized as the modern era in AI, and catalyzed our work using AI to tackle scientific problems. Since that breakthrough, our AI systems have helped accelerate advances in fields like materials discovery, fusion energy research, mathematical reasoning and biology.
This summer, Google DeepMind and Google teams will begin to move into Platform 37. Together our world-leading AI researchers, engineers, ethicists and others will build on our track record of safe and responsible AI development.