ANN/THE STRAITS TIMES – A Bahasa Indonesia version of a ChatGPT-like tool is in development. This is thanks to a recent collaboration agreement between Singapore and Indonesia in the field of artificial intelligence (AI). Four Indonesian entities signed a letter of intent in Jakarta with AI Singapore, the Republic’s national AI program, to jointly create a new large language model (LLM) tool utilising technology similar to that of ChatGPT and Google’s Bard.
The aim is to collaborate on the development of an open-source LLM tool for Bahasa Indonesia, ensuring accessibility to a broad audience, as outlined in their joint release.
The Indonesian agencies involved include the archipelago’s National Research and Innovation Agency and the Collaboration for Research and Innovation in Artificial Intelligence (Korika).
The other two are AI tool development firms Glair.ai and Datasaur.ai, which are both backed by venture capital firm GDP Venture.
LLMs process large amounts of information and learn how language is used, allowing them to analyse text, understand the context of queries, generate human-like text in response to instructions, and perform other language-related tasks.
These tools have surged in popularity in the past year ever since ChatGPT, developed by United States (US) -based research organisation OpenAI, burst onto the scene and allowed everyday netizens to access such technology. The joint release noted that Bahasa Indonesia makes up just 0.6 per cent of content online, citing figures released in January by global research firm Statista. In comparison, English accounts for 58.8 per cent of online content.
“This fact emphasises the imperative for broader research and development endeavours, aiming to cater to the unique linguistic nuances and demands of Bahasa Indonesia,” they said.
LLM tools have a lot of potential in various areas of the economy, but many come from the US or China and may not be fully suited to Southeast Asia, said AI Singapore head of strategy, partnerships and growth Darius Liu.
Collaboration between countries to create such tools for the region is important to address the under-representation of Southeast Asia in LLMs commonly used today, he said. AI Singapore was launched in 2017, bringing together Singapore-based research institutions to grow knowledge in the field and develop the country’s AI efforts. It also works with overseas partners to build new tech tools.
Indonesia’s Deputy Minister of Communication and Informatics Nezar Patria added that the collaboration underscored how AI has helped workers in the country become more efficient in their jobs, and how it could help with the nation’s growth in the future.
