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Microsoft will mark its 50th anniversary in April 2025. (GeekWire File Photo / Todd Bishop)
Microsoft’s AI for Good Lab is offering a total of $5 million in cloud computing credits in its home state of Washington through a new grant program in conjunction with the company’s 50th anniversary.
The lab is looking to support projects in public health, education, sustainability, and humanitarian action through the AI for Good Open Call, which was announced Wednesday morning.
It’s part of a larger effort by Microsoft to support organizations and initiatives in the Seattle area and Washington state as a way of giving back to the place where it has been based for most of its history. Co-founders Bill Gates and Paul Allen moved the company to the region from Albuquerque, N.M., in the late 1970s.
The new open call from the AI for Good Lab is geared toward non-profits and academics, but it could also incorporate startups and other businesses with projects that have the potential to impact society positively, said Juan Lavista Ferres, chief data scientist and director of Microsoft’s AI for Good Lab.
Past open calls by Microsoft, in areas including health and humanitarian action, have surfaced specific problems that otherwise wouldn’t have been on the company’s radar, allowing it to work with outside organizations to apply AI in novel ways.
“It opens our minds,” Lavista Ferres said. “It opens our capacity to analyze these unknown unknowns.”
Juan Lavista Ferres, Microsoft corporate vice president, chief data scientist, and AI for Good Lab director, at his desk in his Redmond office. (GeekWire File Photo / Todd Bishop)
The AI for Good Lab operates as part of Microsoft Philanthropies, separate from the company’s product groups.
The grant program will come in the form of Microsoft Azure credits. The credits could be used for training and running AI models, in addition to more traditional cloud computing workloads. The company says it will also give grantees access to scientists and researchers in its AI for Good Lab, for support and assistance.
Depending on the number and nature of the grant applications, the pool of $5 million in Azure credits will probably be split up among about 20 projects and organizations, Lavista Ferres said.
The deadline for online applications is Feb. 17, and Microsoft says it will notify selected grantees by March 18. Grantees need to be based in Washington state or benefit the state and its residents, the company says.
Examples of external initiatives supported by the AI for Good Lab include the QuitBot smoking cessation app from Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center, and the work of the Baker Lab at the University of Washington’s Institute for Protein Design.
The Microsoft lab uses AI with data such as bioacoustics and satellite imaging for a variety of projects.
The new open call is expected to support a wide range of projects. It helps if grantees already have access to data that they can use in conjunction with AI models, although it’s not a requirement, Lavista Ferres said.
Applicants don’t necessarily need extensive technical expertise, but they should have the ability to independently run a project after receiving the cloud computing credits and working with Microsoft’s experts through the program, he said.
Microsoft plans to mark its 50th anniversary in April of this year. As part of its anniversary, the company has launched with a broader program that it calls “One Future. One Sound.” Microsoft announced in September that it would make 50 grants of $50,000 each to organizations in the region.
