Amazon and Carnegie Mellon University Launch Strategic AI Innovation Hub

Amazon and Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) announced today the launch of the CMU-Amazon AI Innovation Hub, reinforcing a shared commitment to advancing cutting-edge research through academic-private sector partnerships. 

The Hub builds on existing collaborations between Carnegie Mellon and Amazon and will include research on generative AI, robotics, natural-language processing and cloud computing technologies. As part of the collaboration, Amazon will provide substantial funding for research projects, doctoral fellowships, and community-building initiatives designed to accelerate innovation in foundational and emerging technologies. 

"The convergence of agentic AI, robotics and natural-language processing represents an unprecedented opportunity to reshape how we live and work," said Swami Sivasubramanian, vice president of agentic AI at Amazon Web Services. "By partnering with CMU, a recognized pioneer in these fields, we're creating an ecosystem where breakthrough research can be rapidly transformed into solutions that benefit society at large."

The Hub's initial focus areas leverage both institutions' strengths in artificial intelligence and robotics, supported by Amazon's global leadership in cloud computing and AI services. Research projects will explore challenges in responsible AI development, advanced robotics systems and next-generation cloud infrastructure, utilizing CMU’s cross-campus interdisciplinary approach.

“At Carnegie Mellon, we believe that true innovation happens when discovery and application move hand in hand,” said Theresa Mayer(opens in new window), CMU’s vice president for research. "By bringing together our faculty and students with Amazon scientists, we will harness some of the most promising opportunities in AI, robotics and cloud computing. This partnership embodies our strategy to strengthen collaboration across disciplines with industry — creating new pathways for innovation that benefit society and expand the frontiers of knowledge.” 

The Hub will support:

• Joint research projects between CMU faculty and Amazon scientists.
• Ph.D. fellowships focusing on key technical challenges in AI.(opens in new window)
• Regular symposia and workshops to foster collaboration.

The first Hub-sponsored research symposium will be held Oct. 28 on CMU's Pittsburgh campus, and will bring together leading researchers from both institutions to share insights and establish collaborative research agendas.

Amazon has maintained a growing presence in Pittsburgh with research teams focused on natural-language processing, automatic speech recognition, machine translation, information retrieval, spoken-language understanding, edge computing and text-to-speech. With support from Gov. Josh Shapiro and other government leaders, the company announced this summer plans to invest at least $20 billion in Pennsylvania(opens in new window) to expand its data center infrastructure for AI and cloud computing.