ARM

What we are doing

Artificial Intelligence as a Gateway to Impact for Children  

In this new phase of our strategic collaboration, Arm and UNICEF are focusing on projects that utilise Artificial Intelligence (AI) to address some of the world’s toughest challenges affecting the lives of children in this and coming generations. The partnership aims to:  

• Build impactful and scalable AI solutions, aiming to increase accessibility and address issues caused by climate change.    

• Accelerate the development and sharing of assets and resources to shape and advance global responsible AI efforts.  

The AI solutions  

• Speech-to-text and text-to-speech technology for youth engagement  
  In 2011, UNICEF developed U-Report, a mobile messaging platform that empowers young people around the world to engage with and speak out on issues that matter to them. As many users of the platform are challenged with low literacy or only speak local languages, this limits their ability to interact with U-Report. Building on positive results from the previous collaboration between Arm and UNICEF’s U-Report initiative, the partnership will help incorporate speech-to-text and text-to-speech technology into the platform to boost engagement and amplify the voices of young people. The integration of the technology will be piloted in Burkina Faso for Mooré and French speakers. 
    

• Speech recognition technology for inclusive digital learning  

In Indonesia, Arm and UNICEF are supporting the scaling of  Bookbot, a gamified app focusing on improving pronunciation, comprehension and reading among primary school children. By funding this programme, Arm is supporting UNICEF’s efforts to help children improve literacy through real-time, on-device speech recognition technology.  

• Air quality monitoring for children’s health  

Arm supports UNICEF in its mission to prevent the negative effects of climate change on children’s education and health. The partnership supports air quality monitoring programmes in Laos whichuses an open-source air quality model to monitor and predict air quality. The data collected will help identify preventative measures to inform policy and help protect children’s health.

Climate entrepreneurship in Malawi   

Arm continues to support the African Drone and Data Academy in Malawi, helping to fully operationalise the incubator centre which aims to foster co-creation of innovative solutions geared towards bolstering climate resilience in communities, while empowering young individuals with 21st-century skills and entrepreneurship competencies. 

Learning Innovation Hub

Arm also supports UNICEF Office of Innovation’s Global Learning Innovation Hub, leveraging the power of technology and their unique convening power to influence the global education landscape, alongside the tech industry, and shape the future of learning. The partnership aims to improve learning outcomes by exploring how AI technologies can be used as a game changer to bridge the digital divide and address the learning crisis. 

Partnership highlights

• • Wearables for Good – In 2015, UNICEF and Arm partnered with design firm frog to launch the Wearables for Good Challenge, hailed as one of the most globally inclusive technology and design challenges. We wanted to demonstrate wearables can go beyond fitness to address health challenges for children. From the 250 applications, SoaPen and Khushi Baby were taken through a business incubation programme and were awarded $15,000 each to develop their ideas further.
• Gates Grand Challenges – In September 2018 the Global Grand Challenges Explorations was launched to urge innovators to discover and develop meaningful digital solutions that improve access to safe, clean water and sanitation in urban areas. Having received over 550 proposals from 47 different countries, 15 solutions were selected to go through an accelerator bootcamp to bring their concepts to life. Check out the case study here to find out more about the challenge and grantees.

• • U-Report Chatbot –A new chatbot feature was built for the U-Report mobile engagement platform. This facilitated the exchange of lifesaving information during the pandemic for millions of young people across 42 countries. Through their regular communication channels, users were able to ask U-Report questions about Covid-19 and received pre-programed answers from experts. The Chatbot strengthened the ability to assess needs, tackle misinformation, and share reliable information on where communities could seek assistance. Following the release of COVID-19 vaccines in 2021, the platform continued to function as a particularly useful and timely tool in building vaccine confidence.

• • Flood Modelling – Working in collaboration with the UNICEF Malawi Country Office, Arm is supporting work on predictive flood modelling using drones and AI for emergency preparedness. While unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) use is helpful at the onset of emergency, drones combined with machine learning can create more impact through predictive analytics and insights before a natural disaster strikes. Conducting flood mapping using ground data collection, GIS, and drones allows for a faster flood assessment which can improve our humanitarian efforts and save more lives.

• • Giga – Launched in 2019 by UNICEF and the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) Giga aims to connect every school in the world to the Internet. Giga brings together global leaders in finance and technology, including Arm, to accelerate the innovations and investments critical to closing the digital divide. Inspiring Arm’s people to get behind our mission is an important part of our partnership. Between 2019 till 2021, we have held many mapping volunteering sessions which directly engaged Arm employees. Mapping work undertaken by volunteers from Arm helped plot over 75,000 buildings, home to over 300,000 people.

• Inspiring the Tech Industry – UNICEF and Arm are inspiring the tech industry to innovate for impact and collaborate towards building a world fit for every child through development of Digital Public Goods. Over 2 billion lives can be changed by investing in emerging cities across the world, while also generating up to $2 trillion in revenue by 2022 (Tech Bets for an Urban World research). Our ambition is to provide a platform that discovers, develops and shares open-source technologies or data or software and contribute to identifying over 200+ open-source Digital Public Goods projects.