After USDT, Tether is looking for the next "gold mine" and has invested about $2 billion in AI and alternative financial infrastructure.

Author: Chloe, PANews

Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino revealed Tether’s latest Local AI development kit at the ₿ Plan event in Lugano, Switzerland on October 26. This new AI development kit focuses on user privacy and is supported by peer-to-peer technology.

The standout feature of Local AI is its versatility, allowing developers to run their code on a variety of devices, from low-cost smartphones to high-end smartphones, laptops, or large systems equipped with the H100 processor. Additionally, this technology can be applied to a range of devices, including smart refrigerators and car entertainment systems.

In March of this year, Tether announced the establishment of a new artificial intelligence department, “Tether data,” dedicated to advancing its foray into the field of AI, with the goal of building the next generation of open source AI models. Under the leadership of Paolo Ardoino, the newly established AI department Tether data focuses on the development of “Open Source, multimodal AI models”, a significant move aimed at improving the accessibility and efficiency of AI, and driving the determination of AI and peer-to-peer technology.

Introducing Local AI Committed to Breaking the Application Scope of Traditional Computing Devices

During the recent Lugano Plan ₿ event in Switzerland, Ardoino showcased how Local AI can go beyond the scope of traditional computing devices. The software development kit (SDK) can ultimately be implemented in smart home appliances, including refrigerators and car entertainment systems, highlighting its vast potential applications.

Local AI particularly emphasizes “local” computation, which means that AI computations are performed by users on their own devices and adopt P2P (peer-to-peer) technology, allowing devices to directly exchange data.

The traditional network architecture is that each image, website, or application has its own server, and each server has its own IP address. When we browse web pages, we send requests to the server through the IP address, so it can be said that the server controls the ownership of the users.

P2P is when every user on the network is responsible for storing all or part of the data. In addition to being able to send requests to other IP addresses, they also need to handle requests from others, which means they are also servers. This is the goal of Tether in promoting AI and peer-to-peer technology.

One key feature of Local AI is its ability to load and store model weights and fine-tune data within a P2P framework. This approach ensures that users’ personal sensitive information is kept secure and reduces reliance on central servers. During the Plan ₿ event, Ardoino demonstrated a fully local and privacy-focused translation application that can run on any device, avoiding the sharing of personal data with third parties, and is also compatible with various models (such as Marian and Llama). In addition, the foundation of Local AI is based on the Open Source project “holepunchto/bare”, which plays a crucial role in its structure.

Assuming that the user is using a translation application developed based on the Local AI SDK, which can directly obtain updated language models from other users, the user’s personal device can directly share optimized translation results with other devices, and all these information exchanges are encrypted and do not need to be routed through a central server.

Finally, Tether plans to offer the Local AI SDK as Open Source software after completing comprehensive testing. This move will benefit developers and the community interested in AI and privacy-related technologies, and also marks Tether’s continued expansion of its AI technology products, not limited to stablecoin services.

Last year, buying chips accumulated Computing Power capital, and this year established a department to expand AI business

Tether’s net profit in 2023 reached $6.2 billion. In September last year, Tether made a big investment in AI hardware, spending $420 million to purchase 10,000 Nvidia H100 GPU chips. Each H100 chip is worth about $40,000, accounting for approximately 2% of Nvidia’s total annual shipment of 550,000 H100 GPU chips.

And at the time, this transaction was part of Tether’s collaboration with BTC miner Northern Data Group, which could obtain a large amount of H100, while Tether could obtain a 20% stake in Northern Data. Forbes also mentioned that Northern plans to rent these graphics cards to AI startups in urgent need of a large amount of Computing Power, which could make Northern Data the largest GPU operator in Europe, second only to Amazon, Microsoft Azure, and Oracle.

In March this year, Tether announced the establishment of Tether Data, a department focusing on AI. The expansion of its AI business will focus on several key areas. First, it aims to develop open-source multimodal AI models to establish new industry standards and promote innovation and accessibility in AI technology. In an interview with WIRED, Ardoino mentioned that the concept of decentralization can be applied to different fields, such as AI. We have seen AI being heavily politicized and believe that having a role independent of traditional tech companies like Amazon, Microsoft, and Google is crucial.

Secondly, Tether data seamlessly integrates AI solutions into products in the market, using technology to address real-world challenges. Finally, by actively participating in the broader ecosystem through community contributions, Tether data is committed to advancing the open AI field while showcasing its innovative projects.

Ample Cash, Tether Targets Amazon, Microsoft, and Google

In June this year, Tether released a report stating that the profit for the first half of 2024 was 5.2 billion US dollars, with a total reserve of 118.5 billion US dollars. After serving as CTO for six years, Ardoino took over as CEO last December. Under his leadership, Tether has made key investments in energy development, BTCMining, and communication technology to achieve investment diversification.

Ardoino said that part of the funds will be used to establish a buffer for the USDT reserves, while the remaining funds will be invested in the company’s new venture department, Tether Evo. The company has acquired a majority stake in Blackrock Neurotech, a new startup in the field of neural implant technology. ‘Brain-computer interface (BCI) technology will become very important in the future. It is also important to build a brain and computer interface that respects individual privacy and ensures that data is kept locally and not collected by a single company operating platform,’ said Ardoino in an interview.

In addition, Ardoino also stated in the interview that AI is another important area of Tether’s business expansion. Tether’s VC evaluates hundreds of proposals every month, most of which come directly from startups. It has invested about $2 billion in AI and alternative financial infrastructure. For Tether, investing in AI means not only technological innovation but also ensuring that the company is always at the forefront of technology.